#which she’s actually able to apply when she’s Supergirl

[riyalizations]

Look, I know this is incredibly self-indulgent as a WOC myself, but I’ve just been thinking about this, especially since I’m reminiscing about Indian weddings I’ve been to.

Imagine Kara landing on Earth and, instead of the Danvers looking biologically-related to Kara, they’re a family of Indians living in America.

Imagine her feeling that the difference in their looks versus hers is another way she feels alone on this planet, until she starts to realize that’s not the case.

Imagine her drawing parallels between the sun god Surya and her own Rao, and using that to feel closer to this completely new family.

Imagine her and the Danvers doing their best to incorporate Rao into their own celebrations, helping Kara feel at home without making her forget her old one.

Imagine her hating the fireworks during Diwali—they remind her too much of the planet she saw fall apart in front of her eyes—but falling in love with the colorful chaos of Holi.

Imagine her not understanding why the kids whisper about Alex in the hallways, because all she can think is that the melanin means that her sister has been touched by Rao.

Imagine her not feeling alone in her otherness because, even if it’s not the same experience, Alex still knows what it’s like to be fundamentally different.

And most of her story is still the same, but she’s able to further understand the sheer power that she has—both as a Kryptonian and as someone who presents as white—when sometimes compared to her adoptive family. And she uses this knowledge when she becomes Supergirl, intervening so that the police don’t have to become involved in situations where they would do more harm than good, and more.

And imagine her meeting Lena—Lena who shies away from the sun from being burned rather than embraced. Lena who immediately jumps headfirst into any and all festivals Kara celebrates with Alex, going so far as to have L-Corp hold special events for these events. Lena, whom Kara feeds a million sweets from a nearby Indian restaurant, and when she finds out what Lena’s favorites are, flying over to India to get them freshly-made from the source.

And the scenario that’s been stuck in my head and caused this whole train of thought in the first place is the thought of Alex and Kelly’s wedding, only it’s a traditional Indian wedding on Alex’s request.

Imagine Kara thriving in the rambunctious environment of it all, stuffing her face with pakoras and jalebis, leading the dance procession on the day of the wedding, using her art skills to intricately draw gorgeous henna designs for both Alex and Kelly.

Imagine the wedding itself being the most beautiful thing Kara has seen, and the closest she’s felt to home. Imagine Alex pulling her aside and telling her that out of the five elements that are revered during the wedding ceremony, space is the one she cares for the most, since she never would have met her sister without it.

Imagine Kara feeling her home from the garlands exchanged reminding her of Kryptonian wedding bracelets.

And all she can think of is Lena.

Imagine Lena being shy during the reception, but soon realizing that there’s not such thing as standing alone in an Indian function, least of all an Indian wedding.

Imagine Kara pulling Lena from the crowd, spinning them both around to the pounding beat of a Bollywood song, before they both break apart, a little dizzy but high on their joy.

Imagine Lena being halfway-forced to feel loved, because with the family Kara comes from, there’s no such thing as simply staying to the side. All night long, she dances in an ornate lengha, letting the tabla in the song carry her and Kara and they clasp hands and spin around so fast that Lena thinks she might start flying. And she is wanted, and she is loved.

And when her and Kara get married, they’re able to make their own adjustments. The food, the sweets, the reception are all the same. But instead of garlands, they exchange bracelets. Instead of tying together their sashes, they show the symbolism by each holding a part of Kara’s cape. Instead of reading vows in Sanskrit with the fire-deity, they get married to the melodic lilt of Kryptonese as they pay their respects to Rao.

And Kara knows she looks different from her family, but she’s fine with that. Because in this moment, she’s never felt closer to any of them—Zor-El and Alura, the Danvers, Lena. A piece of them is forever a part of her.

[kassies-take]

Angels to Devils

Summary: A possible assassination attempt success.

A/n: My headcanon Supercorp family. With the twins Lucas and Liam, and you the oc Lauren. Sorry in advance

Warning: Blood, Heavy Injuries, ANGST

Supercorp, Kara Danvers x Reader, Lena Luthor x Reader

Word Count: 2136

Lena usually loved waking up to mornings, Kara by her side and the world so still and quiet that nothing can ruin it. The past few days have been rough. It was another reminder that Lena had something someone else couldn’t have. Another day.

Lena’s eyes filled with tears, her stream of tears flowed into her ear and soaked the pillow. Kara wasn’t awake but Lena held onto her like she was a lifeline. Kara stirred and was immediately awoken to hug her wife.

The casts she wore restricted her movements. Kara was careful to not hurt Lena.

“It’s today isn’t it.” Lena nodded as Kara fought her tears.

You didn’t have a normal childhood, anyone with a Luthor and a Super as parents wasn’t normal. Although it wasn’t normal you knew you were loved.

You were every bit like Lena whereas Liam and Lucas were every bit like Kara. It never really bothered you that you didn’t have powers because without their powers you can easily defeat them in hand-to-hand combat.

To say Lena was proud is an understatement, she was on the sidelines raising her fists, and screaming “Go get Em’ baby!” While Lucas, Liam and Kara flushed red.

It was midsummer before your first quarter at M.I.T , you were partaking in Lena’s work days. Paperwork, meetings and your favorite lab times.

“Ren, I need you to raise the levels to 80%.” Lena watched with a tablet in her hands.

“It is actually on full power already.” You smiled.

Lena faced you before moving her head towards her tablet. “Normally I would lecture you on testing protocols but it works!” Lena placed her tablet down and squeezed you in a hug. “We have successfully made a new renewable and efficient energy source.”

“We also very much stole technology from Argo,” you laughed.

“Don’t ruin the moment.” Lena chuckled, moved back and held your head in between her hands. “My little scientist, you will do great things in the future.” Lena kissed your forehead.

“I think I’d have to start with preventing grey hair without dyes.” You joked.

Lena glared. “Okay smarty pants. You can write the report.”

You groaned as Lena smirked. “Do I have to?”

“This is only practice for the future sweetheart. Plus I have to make sure all the Pauls don’t pull out of any mergers.”

“Ugh those skeezebag lawyers, sometimes I wish I had heat vision.” Your hand shook as if you were preventing yourself from choking someone.

“Careful there,” Lena raised an eyebrow “you sound like a Luthor.”

You grabbed the tablet out of your mother’s hands and pulled the stool in front of the computers. “I hate to burst your bubble but I’m a Luthor and a Super, if you have a problem with that the door is behind you.” You replayed with a teasing tone.

“Okay I really have to go deal with Paul now, behave.” Lena sighed.

“C’mon mama I’m not Lucas.” You began to type several results into the computer.

“Good thing your brother didn’t hear that.” Lena hugged you before heading towards the door. “I’ll see you later. Love you.”

“Love you too mama, more than I love Jeju.” Lena’s heart melted. That was something she was going to brag to Kara about.

Lena sat in the conference room, calm and collected when she really wanted to rip her hair out. She could tell that the other females in the room were feeling the same. The CEO was glad that Sam spoke up about wasting time and had ended the meeting with the final merge successful. 

Sam and Lena walked out of the conference room towards the elevator. When the door dinged opened they were met with a smile and an armful of Lena’s things.

“Hi baby, did you finish the report?” Lena hugged you and grabbed her purse. 

“I got bored,” You shrugged “And Aunt Sam said you were close to ripping out hair that wasn’t grey.” 

“So you texted my daughter?” Lena raised her eyebrows at Sam. 

“For someone who is a genius you’re missing out on the fact that your daughter just said I contacted her.” 

“She texted the Spoiled group chat.” Lena gave a questioning glance at the group name. 

“The group chat with Aunt Sam and the rest of the Superfriend’s Legacies.” 

“I’m the cool Aunt,” Sam smirked. “But now go have fun with the rest of your day off, promise you’ll tell great stories?” Sam hugged you. “And keep your mom away from work, this was really meant to be her day off.” 

“Of course! Bye Aunt Sam!” You waved as she left the elevator. “Do I get to drive home?” 

“Absolutely not!”

“So I get to help in the lab, but I can’t drive home.” You reasoned as you both walked to the underground garage. “I get to pick the music then?” 

You raced towards the passenger seat. You closed the door behind you and locked it immediately. Lena pulled on the door handle and pressed on the keys to unlock the car. You once again locked the car which earned the famous Luthor eyebrow raise.

Lena entered the car as you laughed at her. You knew she wouldn’t be able to keep the silent treatment for much longer.

“I’m sorry, it’s fun to mess with you and Jeju. I’ll make it up to you by playing your old music.” You said as you placed your phone on a magnetic Bluetooth connector and played an *NSYNC song.

“*NSYNC is not old!” Lena drove out of the underground packing.

“Mama, you’re 51. NSYNC is 49 years old. Half a century! It’s old.”

“I’m gonna pretend like you didn’t say that!” Lena said as she raised the volume and belted out the lyrics.

It doesn't matter,

'bout the car I drive or the ice around my neck

All that matters,

Is that you recognize that it’s just about respect (oh)

“It’s all about respect mama,” you teased.

“It better be, I’m a Luthor.” You both laughed.

The car came to a stop at the intersection on Main Street and Cordova. Lena drummed on the steering wheel and sung the chorus. You grabbed a water bottle and held it as a mic.

“Do you ever wonder why, this music gets you high?” The two sang.

The car jolted forward with a loud crash. You groaned at the burn at your neck. A sharp hiss rendered quiet with screeching tires and a horn.

A huge blow hit the car. Suddenly the car tilted towards the ground. An immense weight thrown onto you, with glass sprinkling down. Yours and Lena’s heads whipped side to side as the car flipped several times.

Shallow breaths threatened the immense silence that floated through the street.

~Lena’s POV~

A warm liquid bounced off my cheek. The cold cement acted as my bed. I didn’t have to look to know my left leg and left arm broke. I looked around trying to register what had happened.

My heart threatened to jump out of my chest, as I witnessed my daughter’s soft hand stained red and dangled limply above me. She was suspended above me, a bone or two protruded out of her side. The only thing that stopped her from falling was the seatbelt.

“Lauren baby,” My own voice unrecognizable and unsteady.

I turned to the watch on my left arm, there it sat shattered. I reached towards Lauren’s bloody hand that had her super watch. I flipped open the watch, relieved when her pulse thumped faintly.

A soft thud landed in front of the windshield. I knew it was Kara and J’onn.

“Lena! Lauren!” I heard my wife call.

The car lifted and more of Lauren’s blood flowed onto the seat, compartment and my clothes.

“Wait no no no! The car is applying pressure to one of Lauren’s wounds.”

“I can phase in, apply pressure and get her out. Where are her injuries?”

There was a moment of silence before Kara answered. “Two of her ribs are broken, her right forearm fractured, lower back spinal injury, her other arm is dislocated, broken ankle, t-the seatbelt cut her stomach.”

“I’ll get her to the D.E.O.”

J’onn glowed red and flew through the car. The Martian lifted my daughter like a feather and vanished through the top.

The car flipped up right and I could only groan in response.

“I’ve got you. I’ve got you.” Kara carried me delicately.

~3rd POV~

Supercorp landed on the D.E.O balcony. Kara guided Lena into the MedBay. However they were met with teary eyed Superfriends. Alex had tears pooled in her eyes, Nia sobbed, as J’onn stared into space. Brainy was left to share the bad news.

“You may want to sit down for this.” Brainy waited for Kara and Lena. “Lauren’s injures were very...severe, she also had internal injuries. She didn’t make it.”

Lena froze, she pushed off the bed. “No, no she can’t, she can’t be dead! Where is she?” She stepped with her broken leg and collapsed into Kara’s arm.

“Mrs. Luthor-Danvers we need to tend to your wound.” Dr. Hamilton said from the door.

“You will not! Not until I see my daughter!”

“Bring her a wheelchair,” Alex ordered.

In the D.E.O morgue, a few morticians cleaned Lauren’s body. Two stitched up her body as one cleaned the blood off the youngest Luthor-Danvers’ skin.

“Give Lena and Supergirl space.” The three morticians stepped out of the room.

Lena was wheeled onto one side and Kara stood on the other. Lauren was still warm. Kara held onto her daughter’s hand. She didn’t realize how deafening it was to not hear your heart.

The two parents sobbed. Lena caressed her daughter’s cheek. “I am, I am so sorry baby. You... you had so much more to look forward to. Jeju and I will always love you. Always.” Lena whispered and kissed your forehead. “Always.” Tears rolled down Lena’s cheeks.

Dr. Hamilton rolled Lena into the operating room.

“Little one,” Kara sobbed. She remained there until Lucas and Liam walked through the doors.

The twins were off on a college baseball retreat, and wore their red sun braclets. They received a call from Alex and had to realistically take a 2 hour plane ride back.

“Jeju,” The two boys whispered and hugged Kara. “Is mom okay?”

“She’s okay.”

“Kara, Lena is in recovery.” Alex said from the door. Kara nodded and headed back towards the MedBay.

“Lauren,” Liam whispered. “How I wish you were just sleeping.”

“I love you, Ren. Thank you for pushing me to the best I could be. Wouldn’t have been able to be Lucas Luthor-Danvers without you.” Lucas cried.

“Don’t worry about us okay, we will be okay.” Liam wiped his tears away.

Everyone of Kara’s friends and family sat on top of a hill that looked over National City. The Legends, Team Flash, Team Arrow, The Bat Family, Lucy Lane, Kal-El’s family, Sam and Ruby, Superfriends and your cousins were there.

Eliza flew in from Midvale a couple of days ago, Alura landed on Earth an hour ago and even Lillian was there in honor of her granddaughter.

Lillian was furious that your death was cause by an assassination attempt on Lena. She had pulled up security cameras and tracked the man who purposefully hit Lena’s car.

Lauren laid in a red pod and floated next to her designated tree. Everyone was given a chance to say something about you.

Kara talked about hearing your first heartbeat, Lena on helping her in the labs. Liam about how you were able to keep him and Lucas out of trouble. Lucas focused on the last midnight talk the two of you shared. Alex shared how you were a fighter.

J’onn shared your last thoughts, he shifted into your form. “I’m scared to leave this world not because I am afraid of death but because I’m scared of leaving everyone I love behind. I don’t regret anything because of everyone I had in my life.” Other cute moments were shared before Kara started The Prayer for the Dead.

She moved her hand over the pod. The House of El symbol glowed and the glass of the pod became transparent. Kara took a deep and shaky breath.

“You have been the sun of our lives. Our prayers will be the sun that lights your journey home.” Kara released another shaky breath and looked towards the horizon. “We will remember you in every dawn and await the night we join you in the sky.” Kara’s eye glistened. “Rao’s will be done.” She finished in Kryptonian.

Alura pushed the pod and it slowly flew higher and further into the horizon. Lena pinned a sign on a tree that read:

Lauren Luthor-Danvers

2027 - 2044

[captain-josslett]

Broken Melody - Part Five

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Eleven,

Summary: Grammy Award winning Emma Danvers is the first to say she has a pretty good life. But what happens when it implodes around her and it looks like things will never be the same again?

Words: 5.8k+

Warnings: Smut... 18+ (duh)

Pairings: Emma Danvers x Lena Luthor, Alex Danvers x Kelly OlsenIn

This Part: It’s the L-Corp New Years Eve Gala and Emma and Lena haven’t seen each other since the kiss on Christmas Day.

This will be the last part until the angst train plows through everything! 

As always B!D is named.

Thank you for reading and let me know if you wanna be tagged or any general feedback will be greatly appreciated.

Taglist: @thewitchandtheassassin , @natasha-danvers , @life-is-hella-unfair , @finleyfray​, @supergirl-writingz​

Emma and Kara sing loudly as they dance around in their underwear and dressing gowns. They are meant to be getting ready for L-Corp’s New Year’s Eve Gala but Taylor Swift’s song, ‘Shake It Off’, comes on and they can’t help but dance and sing along. Alex quietly ignores them as she applies her makeup.

“Come on Alex!” Emma whines behind her, pulling her famous puppy dog eyes.

Alex scoffs softly and rolls her eyes at her in the mirror.

“Please Alex.” Kara joins in and pouts her lower lip, letting it quiver.

Alex really tries her best to ignore them… But the combined efforts of her two sisters weakens her resolve. She rises to her feet to the whooping of the two blondes and dances with them to the rest of the song. The three of them laughing and moving energetically.

The song finally ends and Alex goes back to the mirror and sits down to finish. “The car will be here soon.” She says looking over at her two sisters.

“Yes boss.” Emma salutes and laughs as she wanders over to her walk in wardrobe. She looks between the two dresses she has picked out for the event. Both red but one is more modest than the other. And if Emma hadn’t kissed Lena on Christmas day she most likely would have worn that one. But, now knowing Lena was interested in her… Well, that changed things.

They had agreed to talk about it the next day over lunch but Lena had been called away to Japan to an emergency that needed her presence. They have been texting back and forth, but Lena has been adamant that they discuss the next step in their relationship in person.

Emma couldn’t help but worry that Lena had changed her mind. Which, if Lena had, Emma would honour her choice and back away. But Emma hoped that wasn’t the case.

“Em?” Alex walks through the door.

“Yea?” Emma looks away from the dresses and whistles when she sees her eldest sister. Alex is wearing a navy evening gown that made the redhead look stunning. “You look beautiful Al.” Emma smiles warmly at her sister.

“Thank you.” Alex smiles shyly and looks away for a moment. Her gaze focuses on the two red gowns. “Can’t make up your mind?”

“Nope.” Emma sighs heavily.

“Well what’s your reason?” Kara steps into the wardrobe wearing a long, gold gown. The top half is gold lace while the bottom is a beautiful material that simmers in the light.

“Kara!” Emma beams at her, seeing the dress as resembling Kara’s sunny attitude.

“Does it look okay?” Kara asks looking down.

“More than okay! Wow, you both look so stunning!”

“Thanks Em.” Kara smiles brightly at her baby sister. “Now let’s make you just as stunning!” Kara claps before turning to Alex. “Does she have time to try both on?”

Alex looks at her phone. “Barely, if you finish her hair.”

“Can do! Right Emma! Change!” Kara orders.

Emma laughs and grabs the more modest dress. Pulling it over her head, careful not to smudge her makeup. Alex helps zip her up and Emma turns to face her sisters.

They both push their lips forward and look up and down the dress.

“It’s… okay?” Kara tilts her head.

“Try the other one on.” Alex orders.

Emma rolls her eyes and unzips herself, stepping out of the dress and taking the other dress. When she puts the dress on she can feel it's the one before she even turns to get her sister’s opinion. She laughs at Kara’s wide eyes and Alex’s open mouth.

They gaze at the red, high necked, backless dress that clings to Emma’s curves in all the right places. It has a little train and a very long slit up the side but keeps Emma’s modesty but gives enough sex appeal off.

“Wow! Em!” Kara gapes. “That one! Definitely that one!”

“You look incredible.” Alex agrees “I think Lena will love it.” She smiles cheekily at the blushing Emma.

“Yea?” Emma asks shyly.

After everyone had left the Christmas party the sisters immediately descended onto Emma about the kiss under the mistletoe. They followed the blonde into her bedroom and sat on her bed, threatening they won’t leave until Emma tells them everything. Taking a deep breath Emma finally admitted her feelings for Lena. Kara squealed and pulled her into a bone crushing hug before giving her the shovel talk and what she would do if Emma was going to hurt her best friend. Alex just smiled brightly at her sister. Pleased that Emma finally found someone to love and that was worthy of her. They talked until the early hours of the morning about what Emma was going to say at the lunch later with Lena. They fell asleep in each other's arms and were woken by their Mom cooing over them. Their excitement as lunchtime approached was taken when Lena messaged to say she had to go to Japan immediately. The sister’s wrapped Emma in a blanket and they watched Disney films and ate the Cadbury chocolates Kara had flown to get from the UK.

“Lena will totally love it. You’re gonna blow her away!” Kara nods.

“Okay.” Emma breathes out as she makes her way back into the bedroom. She catches herself in the mirror and laughs loudly.

“What?” Alex asks cocking her eyebrow.

“I just realised we are in Supergirl’s colours.” Emma looks at Alex’s navy gown, Kara’s gold gown and her red gown. The smiles Kara gives her is blinding and Alex just smirks while shaking her head.

“How do you want your hair?” Kara asks quickly.

“Half up half down? Maybe plait it round to the back?” As soon as Emma finishes talking she blinks and her hair is finished. “Thanks.” She laughs and checks it out.

“Cars here!” Alex yells from the doorway holding up her phone. “We ready?”

Both sister’s nod and Emma steps into her super high heels.

“I don’t know how you can wear those.” Alex shakes her head.

“A lot of practice!” Emma laughs as she picks up her clutch with her keys and phone in and follows her sister’s to her apartment door. “Plus Dolly encouraged me to wear them as high as I can.”

Kara freezes immediately and Emma almost crashes into her. Kara whips round and stares at her sister.

“Kara?” Emma tilts her head in confusion.

“Dolly?”

“No, I’m Emma.” The singer sasses back and looks at Alex who taps her foot getting more and more impatient.

“No! I mean… Dolly… As in Dolly Parton?!” Kara’s voice somehow goes up an octave.

“Yea, as in Dolly Parton.” Emma smiles at her sister. Forgetting that the celebrities she meets are actually a really big deal to other people.

“Kara! We have to go!” Alex yells as she opens the apartment door and walks out.

Kara looks to Alex and then back to Emma. “We haven’t finished this conversation.” Kara threatens before leaving the apartment, Emma smirking behind her.

The car journey took longer than expected as many vehicles were heading towards the L-Corp Gala. Giving Kara and Alex time to question Emma about any other celebrities she has met. Kara almost hyperventilates when Emma admitted she has Taylor Swift’s phone number and had lunch with the singer in Nashville. Showing her sister’s the selfie they took at the lunch.

But the wait in the car also gave Emma time to get really nervous and excited about seeing Lena again.

“Hey.” Kara says softly, reaching for Emma’s hand and giving it a gentle squeeze. “It will be okay.”

“Yea Em.” Alex agrees next to her sister. “Lena adores you, anyone can see that.”

Emma nods and takes a deep breath to slow down her racing heart.

Finally they pull up to the red carpet and Alex gets out first, then Kara and as soon as Emma glides out the photographers go wild.

“Emma! Over here!”

“You look gorgeous Emma!”

“Emma! Here! Look Here!”

“Smile Emma!”

On and on the photographers yell and Emma takes it in her stride. When she’s placed on the marker in front of them Emma smiles at each camera and poses elegantly. Alex and Kara watch from the sidelines, smiling at how at ease and natural the singer looks. 

Soon Emma is ushered away to allow the next celebrity to pose. Alex sees how Emma blinks to clear the spots in her vision. She reaches out and holds Emma’s hand and Kara does the same. Both guiding her down the long red carpet until she is able to see more clearly again.

Fans scream Emma’s name and she smiles and waves at them. But due to security, members of the public can’t get close which saddens Emma, she likes meeting her fans. Emma has a reputation for spending hours signing autographs and chatting with fans at events. Sometimes almost missing the event completely. But with the recent attempts on Lena’s life, she understands the tight security. After all Lena’s safety is the most important thing to Emma.

“Ready?” Emma asks her sisters, they nod and enter the building. After checking in they enter an elevator to where the gala is being held on the top floors of the building.

As the doors slide open the noise from the gala explodes around them. Emma looks over to Kara who nods at her and shows she remembered to put her dampening setting on her glasses. The sister’s exit the elevator and Alex watches as people are immediately drawn to Emma, like sunflowers to the sun.

Emma leads the sister’s to the open bar, unaware of the attention she is drawing. The bartender immediately serves Emma and she orders Alex’s go to whiskey and non alcoholic drinks for Kara and herself. With the tour coming up Emma can’t afford to have any alcohol. To be honest, she’s never been too fond of drinking anyway. Only really having wine with a meal on the odd occasion.

“There you are!” Kelly says as she wraps her arms around her girlfriend.

“Hi babe.” Alex kisses Kelly passionately before looking up and down Kelly’s dress. “You look beautiful.” Alex says softly causing Emma and Kara to grin at each other before quietly slipping away, giving the two love birds some alone time.

“Wanna dance?” Kara asks, already bopping to the music.

“Of course!” Emma puts her drink and clutch down as does Kara. “M’lady? May I have the honour of this dance?” Emma holds her hand out to her sister who laughs at her.

“And they say I’m the dork!” Kara takes Emma’s hand and follows the blonde to the middle of the dance floor.

The two sisters dance and laugh to many songs, having a great time. They both scream when Abba’s ‘Dancing Queen’ comes on and pull out their best dance moves, drawing the attention of the people around them. Kara smirks when she sees the attention is mainly aimed at Emma, who seems to hypnotise both men and women with her swaying hips. What Kara loves most is that Emma doesn’t even know the power she has over people.

Eventually Brainy and Nia find them, Brainy stands guard by the drinks and Nia joins in with the dancing. A few times all three are asked to dance by other men. But they politely decline. Nia goes back to Brainy when James, Sam, Alex and Kelly join him.

Another man approaches Kara, asking her to dance. Emma smiles sadly when Kara turns them down. Knowing her sister still isn’t over Mon-El yet. She leans towards her sister so Kara can hear her.

“You know you can say yes right?”

“I know… I just… Don’t want to leave you.” Kara says lamely.

“I’ll be fine! Lena should be finishing up soon anyway.”

All the time they’ve been dancing Emma has kept an eye out for the raven haired beauty. Knowing from her experiences of accompanying the CEO to many galas that Lena needs to work the crowd before allowing herself to relax and mingle with her friends. And as this is an L-Corp Gala, Emma knows Lena will most likely be working right up until midnight.

Alex, Kelly and Sam join the two blondes for a few more songs before they decide to stop dancing and refuel on food and drink. All the Superfriends head to the grand spread of food, though Emma doesn’t notice Sam slipping away from them.

Emma smiles when she sees potstickers in the centre of the table. Grabbing a plate she piles it high with lots of yummy foods and much to Kara’s horror, Emma grabs a few carrot and cucumber sticks. Emma laughs loudly and explains she needs to balance it all out.

The Superfriends chat while they eat and suddenly Emma feels like she’s being watched and a warm feeling spreads through her. Emma turns her head and connects with beautiful green eyes across the room.

-- -- --

Lena tries to politely listen as one of L-Corps board members drone on and on about the recent hiccup with the Japanese company. But Lena was running out of patience. Not that she would ever show it.

“I’m sorry to interrupt.” Sam smiles sweetly at the elders board member. “But may I borrow Ms. Luthor?” Not waiting for a response Sam holds onto Lena’s arm, moving her away from the group of board members.

“You’re my hero.” Lena whispers as Sam leads her towards the area where the food is.

“Don’t let Kara hear you say that!” Sam laughs loudly and Lena smiles.

As they walk closer to the food she hears a rich laugh above the noise of the room. One she’d happily listen to for the rest of her life. She starts searching for the source of the heavenly noise.

When she does Lena immediately stops walking and her mouth drops open. Her eyebrows rise when her eyes lock on Emma. Her gaze travels up and down Emma’s body, admiring how it hugs her curves. How it shows off Emma’s toned ass, making Lena want to moan at imagining what must be underneath the fabric.

“Lena?” Sam realises the CEO isn’t following her anymore. She looks at her friend and snorts at the bedroom eyes Lena is sending Emma’s way. Sam heads back to the transfixed woman. “You may want to tone down the fuck me eyes.” Sam softly says causing Lena to jump.

“I don’t have fuck me eyes!” Lena whispers back, not taking her eyes off the blonde.

“Oh trust me, you do.” Sam laughs before heading back to the group.

Emma turns her head and looks right at her through the crowd. Their eyes connect and Lena holds her breath. For a moment all she sees in the room is Emma. The blonde smiles brightly at her and Lena remembers how to breathe and use her legs again. She weaves through the groups and approaches the Superfriends.

“Lena!” Kara yells and gives Lena a one arm hug, careful not to spill any of her food. “You look wonderful! Doesn’t she look wonderful Emma?” Kara smiles at the other blonde.

Lena turns towards Emma and smirks at how Emma’s eyes take her in. How they linger on Lena’s chest. Lena is now happy she chose the mermaid, off the shoulder, dark green dress. Showing just enough chest to, hopefully, peek Emma’s interest. And it seems it's succeeding.

“You look breathtaking Lee.” Emma says softly and holds out a plate with Lena’s favourite food on.

The CEO can’t help but feel a warm sensation in her heart at Emma’s thoughtfulness. “Thank you.” Lena reaches out to take the plate, their hands connecting for a moment and butterflies erupt in her stomach.

The Superfriends start talking amongst themselves. Emma keeps smiling shyly at Lena when she catches the raven haired beauty looking at her dress. All Emma wants to do is find a secluded corner and talk to Lena. As well as other things… Emma feels her cheeks heating up at the thought of kissing Lena again.

But, before she can get ahead of herself, Emma knows they need to see if they are on the same page. She hopes the lingering looks Lena is giving her is a sign that they are.

Emma takes a deep breath to build the courage to ask Lena if they can talk. She turns to the CEO and opens her mouth to speak.

“Ms. Luthor?” Jess appears out of nowhere stopping Emma’s words from leaving her mouth.

Emma sighs quietly as she watches Lena leave with Jess to do some more important mingling. Both Kara and Alex give her sympathetic smiles.

To distract her they pull Emma back towards the dance floor and when they need another break a few other attendees ask Emma questions about her career, the Christmas concert, what her plans were for her solo album, the list went on and on. Emma graciously answers every question where she could. Being honest when she didn’t know the answer, like the actual time frame her new album would be released.

Secretly Emma has been recording a lot of songs in the studio with her long term producer and friend. Mainly to try different styles and see what fits better with Emma’s voice. Most of these songs won’t ever be used, much to Emma’s sadness but it’s been fun experimenting.

Half an hour before midnight Emma goes out to the balcony to get some air. She leans against the railing and gazes at the twinkling lights of the city below.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Lena asks quietly as she stands next to the blonde.

“Honestly?” Emma turns her head to look at her best friend, who nods at her. “I’m thinking about what this new year could bring. I mean it’s silly cause tomorrow will be just another day, and the day after that. But, I guess, with the New Year, it’s always a fresh start.” Emma’s face scrunches up. “Did I make any sense then?”

Lena chuckles. “You did and I would have to agree.” They stand in comfortable silence, just enjoying being in each other’s presence.

“Lee-”

“Em-”

They both stop and smile shyly at each other.

“You go.” Emma says, indicating for Lena to talk first.

“I’m sorry about everything that happened. With me leaving so quickly before we could talk. It wasn’t at all ideal.” Lena rubs her forehead.

“No, but, it happens.” Emma turns to face Lena fully, Lena copies her movement. “Lee… You’re my best friend and I really like you. Like, really, really like you.”

“Really?”

“Really, really.” Emma smiles and averts her eyes for a moment, biting her lip. “And, well…” Her hazel green eyes lift back up to Lena’s. “I’ve grown to care for you more than just my best friend…” Emma drops her head again and turns towards the railing. “Sorry I’m really not good at this!”

“Hey.” Lena reaches out and lifts Emma’s chin towards her. “I really, really like you too and I would love to explore this further.” Lena bites her lips as she finds the right words to say. “I love you Em. It may be too soon to say it, but you are one of the greatest friends and from the moment your sister’s tackled you to the ground I fell in love with you.”

Tears fill Emma’s eyes. “I love you too. With all my heart I love you and I would love to take this next step with you. To be yours.”

“And I yours.” Lena whispers as she moves closer to Emma. Her hand softly stoking Emma’s exposed back. “You do look beautiful tonight.”

“So do you.”

“10! 9! 8! 7! 6! 5!” The crowd inside starts counting down and the two women smile at each other.

“To new beginnings?” Emma asks leaning towards the raven haired beauty.

“New beginnings.” Lena nods and leans the rest of the way. Their lips connect when everyone yells zero.

Lena and Emma experience fireworks immediately. Much like the ones whizzing and booming in the distance. Their bodies heat up as they flush together, deepening the kiss. Not caring if anyone saw them. At the moment it’s only the two of them.

They break the kiss only due to needing air. Pressing their foreheads together.

“Wow.” Lena whispers.

“Yea…” Emma breathes out. Her body tingling.

“Do you want to go slow?” Lena asks, knowing Emma has only been with a few people.

Emma pauses for a moment and looks at Lena. “I… I don’t think I can.” She says smiling shyly.

“Do you want to get out of here?” Lena asks with a heated gaze.

Emma nods but frowns slightly. “What about the gala?”

“Sam can take over. I’ve seen who I have needed to see.” Lena looks around them to make sure no one can hear what she says next. Leaning in she kisses behind Emma’s ear. “Plus, I don’t think I will be able to keep my hands off you a moment longer.”

Emma moans and bites her lip as Lena continues to run her hands up and down Emma’s back. Lowering her neck she kisses under Emma’s jaw. “Lets go.” Emma breathes out.

Lena doesn’t have to be told twice. She grabs Emma’s hand, lacing their fingers together and leading her back inside towards the elevator. They weave quickly through the crowds of people, missing the amused looks the Superfriends give them.

“Emma?!” Kara rushes after her sister holding out the blonde’s clutch.

Emma turns and smiles at her sister. Hoping Kara doesn’t notice her elevated heart rate. “Thanks Kar.”

“See you later?”

“Maybe… I’ll let you know.” Emma smiles when she feels Lena pulling her arm impatiently. “Happy New Year.” Emma calls out to the Superfriends as Lena tugs her towards the elevators.

Lena quickly hits the button for the garage level and when the doors close Lena launches herself at Emma. Pressing the blonde against the wall in a heated kiss.

“God this dress is divine on you.” Lena whispers as she rocks against the blonde and sucks on the Emma’s neck.

“I’m glad you like it.” Emma groans out.

When the doors slide open again the pair pull apart and Lena leads Emma towards her chauffeur’s car.

“Happy New Year Ms. Luthor.” The chauffeur nods at the pair, holding the door open for them. Emma dives in and Lena follows after telling the chauffeur to drive them to her apartment.

Immediately Lena raises the divider and makes sure the windows are on the black out setting. She lifts her tight dress up and straddles the blonde.

“Shouldn't— you wear— a seat-belt?” Emma says between kisses.

Lena pulls her head back and laughs. “We’ll be fine love.” She dives back in and sucks on Emma’s neck, happy to have already found one of Emma’s sensitive spots.

The car swerves and Emma reaches up to steady Lena by grabbing her shapely ass. She squeezes and whimpers.

“You like that?” Lena whispers seductively.

“Yes.” Emma gasps out and Lena starts to grind on her.

Soon the car stops and instantly Lena is off Emma’s lap and heading towards the apartment building. Emma follows quickly behind and grabs Lena’s hand. 

Back in another elevator and they can’t keep their hands off each other as they kiss deeply.

Finally they enter Lena’s apartment and the pair kick off their heels while knocking into furniture and walls, not wanting to break the kiss. They enter Lena’s bedroom and Emma falls back onto the bed. Lena immediately straddles her and kisses her passionately.

But Emma suddenly freezes. The realisation of what is about to happen dawning on her.

“Em?” Lena asks quietly, sensing the shift in Emma. “Are you okay.”

Emma nods.

“Do you still want to do this?”

Emma nods again.

“I need you to use your words love.”

“Sorry.” Emma squeaks. Coughing to clear her throat. She sits up, holding onto Lena as she does so the raven haired beauty doesn’t tumble to the floor. “I just… I’m not the most practiced. I want this to be perfect and I’m, well… Not.” Emma averts her eyes from Lena’s gaze.

“Oh Em.” Lena’s heart immediately breaks knowing that Emma believes this. “Love, look at me please.” Embarrassed hazel eyes connect with Lena’s. “Remember I’ve seen you at your worst and your best. And you’ve seen me too, warts and all.” Emma scoffs, Lena reaches out and cups Emma’s cheeks, wanting the blonde to hear what she has to say. “But to me you are perfect. Sex is meant to have moments of laughter and figuring things out. To truly get to know your lover. If you want to wait, that’s okay. I’d rather you be honest with me.”

“No, I want this. Want you.”

Lena smiles and moves to stand up. She turns her back to the blonde, looking at her over her shoulder. “Unzip me?”

Emma stands and bites her lips as she slowly pulls the zip down. More and more of Lena’s back is revealed to her. Lena reaches down and peels the dress off of her before kicking it out of the way. She turns slowly and Emma focuses on her chest. The strapless push up bra cupping Lena’s breasts.

Taking a breath Emma reaches up to the back of her neck and unclips her dress. The top half flutters down, the rest of the dress staying on her body.

Before Emma can take the rest of the dress off Lena steps forward. “May I?”

Emma nods and Lena slowly pulls the dress down. Emma steps out of it. Leaving them both in their underwear.

“God Emma.” Lena has seen Emma in her underwear and bikini before. But now things are different and Lena can’t help but bite her lip as her eyes wander over the blonde’s toned body. She notices how deep Emma is breathing and focuses on Emma’s dilated eyes. “You okay?”

The blonde smiles. “Yes.” Emma starts to reach towards Lena but pauses. “Can I take your bra off?” Lena nods and Emma continues to move her hands forward. Reaching behind, she unclips the bra. Slowly Emma pulls it off and steps back. She looks down and her mouth waters at the sight of Lena’s naked chest.

“Like what you see?” Lena asks seductively.

“You have no idea.” Emma smiles and reaches out, cupping Lena’s breasts and gently rubbing her thumbs over the nipples.

“Can I take yours off?” Lena breathes out and Emma nods. Still fixated by Lena’s breasts. The raven haired beauty smiles and unclips Emma’s strapless bra. Moaning softly when Emma’s chest is revealed to her. “Gorgeous.” Lena gently runs her hand over Emma’s smaller breasts.

Emma blushes and leans forward. Capturing Lena’s lips in a heated kiss. They moan when their naked chests connect. Emma takes a hold of Lena’s hands and pulls the raven haired beauty towards the bed. They break the kiss and both lie down facing each other. “I can’t believe this is really happening.” Emma kisses Lena softly before pulling away again. “You do want this, right?”

“You have no idea. I’ve wanted this for a long time.”

They gaze into each other’s eyes until Lena can’t take it anymore and kisses the blonde. The kiss gets more and more heated.

Lena moves to straddle Emma and continues to kiss the blonde. But soon she breaks away and slowly kisses down Emma’s body.

“Oh Rao.” Emma whispers out when she realises what Lena’s intentions are.

“This okay?” Lena pauses and lifts her green eyes to Emma.

“Yes, please don’t stop.”

Lena smirks and quickens her descent. She kisses up and down Emma’s inner thighs, which quiver in anticipation. Spreading Emma’s legs Lena makes eye contact with the blonde, who nods at Lena to continue.

She pulls down Emma’s underwear and takes them off. Slowly she looks back at the now fully naked blonde. “Beautiful.” Lena gently parts Emma’s outer labia and licks up from Emma’s pussy to her clit causing Emma’s back to arch off the bed and a deep moan to sound around the room. The noise becomes one of Lena’s favourite sounds and she decides she needs to hear more.

Lena focuses on Emma’s clit, gently rubbing it and causing Emma to let out quick breathy moans.

“Lee. Lee. Fuck.” Emma chants as she reaches out and holds Lena’s other hand.

Spurred on Lena stuffs her face in-between Emma’s legs, licking all around her clit.

“Lee, please!” Emma calls out making Lena smile and answering her wish. She lightly licks the clit repeatedly until applying more and more pressure and speed. Emma responds by bucking her hips more and more. Her moans increasing in volume.

Using her free left hand Lena runs her fingers up and down Emma’s body before finally settling on Emma’s breasts. Massaging them gently and playing with the nipples between her fingers.

“Lee… In me… Lee.” Emma gasps, moving Lena’s right hand she’s holding down to her pussy. Taking the hint Lena moves slightly to get a better angle. Slowly she rubs her finger up and down Emma’s pussy, collecting the juices there. “Yes! Fuck… Me!” Emma grabs onto Lena’s other hand that was massaging her chest.

Lena watches the blonde as she slides her finger into her.

“Fuck!” Emma moans and her hips buck wildly as Lena finds a rhythm of both sucking and thrusting. Soon Lena adds another finger and loves the feel of Emma’s juices flowing from her. “I’m gonna…” Emma throws her head back in a loud moan. Her legs shake and clamp around Lena’s head as the orgasm roars through her.

Lena watches Emma come down from her climax before crawling up her body.

“Hi.” Lena smiles when Emma’s eyes connect with hers.

“Hi.” Emma grins back and attacks Lena’s lips with a searing kiss.

Emma pulls away from the raven haired beauty and smirks. “My turn.” She slowly kisses down Lena’s body and as she settles between Lena’s legs she lifts her head to look at her. “Ready?”

“Yes.” Lena bites her lips and gasps as Emma kisses up and down her inner thighs. “Em… Please.” She feels Emma smirk as she continues to unhurriedly kiss her thighs. Emma slowly pulls Lena’s underwear off and Lena impatiently kicks it off.

Emma hums happily as she gazes at Lena’s neatly shaven pussy. She moves Lena’s folds and licks her lips as more of Lena is revealed to her.

“Em.” Lena whines. 

“Yea?” Emma grins up at her, causing Lena to give her an annoyed glare. Emma tilts her head and slowly lowers her head. Lena reaches out and runs her hand gently through Emma’s hair. Finally Emma’s mouth connects with Lena’s clit and the raven haired beauty hips buck in response.

“Fuck!” Lena screams and Emma has to hold her thighs down to be able to continue. Remembering what Lena did to her Emma steadily increases the pressure and experiments with different parts of her tongue. Listening to Lena’s moans and changes in her breathing. “FUCK!!” Lena cries and pushes Emma’s face further in between her thighs. Soon her legs are shaking and her eyes squeeze shut as she orgasms. “Emma! Em! Fuck!” Lena moans out as her hips grind into Emma’s face.

But Emma isn’t finished, not by a long shot. She watches as Lena slowly comes down from her high and she loosens her hold on Emma’s head. Once she is able to move the blonde scoots up the bed. Dilated green eyes lazily open and look happily at Emma.

Emma smiles softly, trying to take in every detail of how beautiful Lena looks in this moment. “What do you want me to do?”

Lena bites her lower lip. “Fuck me.”

“Fingers?” Emma says before leaning over and kissing Lena’s lips. The raven haired beauty moans as she tastes herself on Emma’s lips. “Or tongue?” Emma pulls back and waits.

“Fingers.” Lena faintly responds. Her brain short circuits with what’s about to happen.

Emma grins and captures Lena’s lips again. Her hand slowly descends down Lena’s body. She gently runs her fingers through Lena’s dripping folds, causing both of them to moan deeply.

Before Emma does anything she pulls slightly away from Lena to see her properly. “Okay?”

Lena nods and gasps as Emma slides a finger into her.

“Oh Lee.” Emma whispers as she moves to kiss and suck Lena’s neck. The feeling of Lena around her finger is mind blowing.

“More.” Lena gasps out after a while and gradually Emma increases the pace with Lena’s hips moving in response. Her moans and gasps grow in volume. “Another finger.”

Emma stops sucking Lena’s neck and looks down as she enters another finger into Lena’s pussy. The sight makes her moan and Lena pulls her into a heated kiss.

Emma curls her fingers and knows she’s found Lena’s g-spot when her hips buck wildly and her back arches. Emma smirks into the kiss and keeps working against the spot. She reaches down with her other hand and gently rubs Lena’s clit causing the raven-haired beauty to break the kiss and yell out. Her breathing increases and Emma feels Lena’s body tense and walls pulse around her fingers.

“Em! Fuck! I’m… I’m… I’m gonna come!”

Emma watches as Lena becomes completely undone. It’s one of the most beautiful sights Emma has ever seen.

Gradually Emma helps Lena come down from her high. When she’s able to remove her fingers she licks them, moaning at the taste.

Lena turns her head to the noise, the sight of Emma sucking her fingers almost makes Lena go over the edge again. Emma tilts her head and a smirk appears on her face.

“You okay?” Emma asks softly.

Lena nods quickly and kisses her passionately. The rest of the night is filled with their moans of pleasure until the early hours of the morning.

“Lee!” Emma throws her head back as her hips grind against Lena. The raven haired beauty watches with a small smile. Transfixed as Emma scrunches up her eyes and tenses as another orgasm floods through her. Her moans filling the room.

Emma collapses next to Lena, gasping for breath. “Lee, that was…” Emma rubs her hands over her face before looking back at her love. “Why haven’t we done this sooner?”

Lena snorts. “You dork.”

Emma smiles but before she can respond she yawns.

“Sorry? Am I keeping you up?” Lena laughs and then yawns herself.

Emma smiles sleepy before kissing Lena lazily.

“Let’s get cleaned up and then we can rest.” Lena moves off the bed, making Emma whine and reach out for her. Lena cocks an eyebrow and sways her hips as she goes to the en-suite.

“Meany.” Emma whispers before rolling off the bed and following.

They both use the bathroom and while Emma cleans herself up Lena quickly changes the damp bed sheets. She gets into bed and waits for Emma. Who rubs her eyes as she shuffles towards the bed and falls into it.

The blonde crawls to Lena and rests her head on her chest. Lena wraps her arms around the blonde, holding her close.

“Love you Lee.” Emma says half asleep, her eyes already closed and breathing deeply.

“Love you too Em.” Lena leans down and kisses the top of Emma’s head. Her own eyes grow heavy and soon they fall into a peaceful sleep.

(Part Six)

[c-optimistic]

kiss

Kara Danvers has never been kissed.

(And neither, for that matter, has Kara Zor-El. Supergirl has been kissed, but it was by an enthusiastic kindergartener, and the sloppy kiss had landed on Supergirl’s cheek as the little girl proclaimed how much she loved the hero. The memory is fond, but not exactly the sort of thing friends get drunk over and gush about.)

No, Kara has never been kissed, and now in her late twenties, she wonders where she went wrong.

Perhaps it was soon after arriving on this planet. At sixteen, still unfamiliar with Earth and full of a general distaste for its obnoxiously loud inhabitants, Kara was first approached in, well, in a romantic sense. Though perhaps ‘romantic’ is a stretch—could the pasty boy sitting next to her in the mind-numbingly boring calculus class turning to her and asking her awkwardly on a date before insulting her truly be considered romantic? Kara doesn’t exactly think so.

Yet, what Alex and Eliza had applauded as her taking a stand against an ‘obnoxious and entitled’ boy (with Alex’s colorful descriptions of his ‘assholishness’ earning a stern look from her mother), was now something Kara almost regretted. Because perhaps, had she been less annoyed by his stupidity and his general smug look every time Kara was forced to hide how utterly asinine she found the class, she could’ve gotten her first kiss out of the way at sixteen.

(She prefers not to think of the pretty girl with kind eyes and wavy hair who was in nearly all of her writing courses in college.

She prefers not to think of how she’d sometimes go to class only to catch a glimpse of her; she prefers not to think of how she’d been too cowardly to speak to her.)

Kara Danvers has never been kissed. Alex claims it’s because she has high standards, because it takes her so long to actually like someone enough to want to kiss them. Eliza always repeats that it would happen on its own time, when Kara least expects it.

And Kara? Well, Kara doesn’t quite care most days. Her lack of a romantic life hadn’t affected her thus far, and barring the idle twinge of regret every time she thought of the people she truly liked and how nothing came of it (like James, or Lucy, or Mon-El, or even Cat), it’s not like she’s particularly bothered.

Still. Some days, when she’s with Alex and Kelly or Nia and Brainy, she wonders.

(She wonders if there’s just something wrong with her, that even worse, Eliza is wrong and Kara is destined to be alone forever.)

Kara Danvers has never been kissed, and it’s all well and good until it somehow becomes front page news.

x

She can count the number of people she dislikes (legitimately dislikes) on one hand. The fact that Andrea Rojas, their new Editor-In-Chief, joins the list and quickly topples the others is quite frankly the least surprising thing to ever happen to Kara.

(Which says quite a bit, considering all that’s happened to Kara.)

The foundation of the dislike is there immediately, when Rojas talks about clicks over substance. It simmers each time Kara’s work is turned into a mangled, biased, unrecognizable mess. But it really hits the necessary threshold the day Rojas calls Kara into her office, a sly smile on her lips.

“I have an assignment for you, Kara,” she says primly, still smiling. “An undercover assignment.”

Kara blinks, once, twice, and clears her throat, certain she’s misheard. “I’m sorry, what?”

“You’re going undercover,” Rojas explains slowly, getting up from her chair and circling around her desk, eyeing Kara like her prey. “You’ll be investigating the previous owner of CatCo Worldwide Media. You know her, don’t you? Lena Luthor?”

(Know her? Not really. Not beyond the handful of conversations as Supergirl, content to trust the DEO—namely Winn, Alex, and Brainy—to keep an eye on the Luthor.

And the distance hasn’t mattered really. Beyond the odd dip into making kryptonite, experimenting on a Worldkiller in an attempt to cure her, and making human super-people, Lena Luthor hasn’t done all that much to draw attention to herself.

But, Kara is willing to concede, Lena does manage to draw a lot of attention with only her looks—specifically Kara’s.)

“Lena,” Rojas continues, taking Kara’s silence for ignorance, “is the younger sister to Lex Luthor and the last remaining member of the disgraced Luthor family.” She smiles briefly, as if she’s letting Kara in on some inside joke, then shrugs. “It seems that the number of attempts on her life have recently, well, decreased. The word on the street is that she’s looking for a bodyguard—a female bodyguard, if you know what I mean.”

“I’m not sure I do.”

“Do I have to spell it out for you, Kara? She’s looking to date again, someone the tabloids won’t take a second look at, someone unassuming and easily dismissed—someone like you.”

Kara takes a step back, shaking her head. “N-no. I’m not a bodyguard, I can’t do that.” She doesn’t have to fake the panic in her tone; a part of Kara is legitimately worried about just how much Andrea Rojas knows about her. “I’m clumsy, and awkward, and chatty, and—”

“Aren’t you listening?” Rojas interrupts, rolling her eyes, turning slightly to pick up a thin folder sitting on her desk, holding it out to Kara expectantly. “The bodyguard position is fake. All you need to do is meet my contact at L-Corp. He’s already got an entry level job lined up for you. The second Lena sees you, I’ve no doubt she’ll be interested.”

“E-excuse me?”

“Come on, Kara, don’t fish for compliments,” Rojas says, waving the folder in an attempt to get Kara to take it. “You’re fit, beautiful, and smart. Just Lena’s type. Trust me, I would know.”

“That’s not what I mean. You’re asking me to infiltrate a company, pursue a fake relationship with the CEO, then put myself in the line of danger if and when she asks me to be her pretend bodyguard so that the paparazzi don’t catch wind of that fake relationship.” Kara shakes her head almost violently, taking another step back. “That’s crazy. Unethical. Probably illegal!”

“Don’t be so dramatic. Besides, do this and you can write whatever you want here, for as long as you work for CatCo. No more binned pitches, no more input from me or anyone else. Give me this one story, Kara, and I’ll give you free rein.” She shakes the folder once more, and Kara realizes this is her final chance. Slowly, hesitantly, and knowing it’s a mistake, Kara accepts the folder.

(It feels a lot like selling her soul to the devil.)

“What do you even want me to write about? What’s the story?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Rojas replies, turning away from Kara and waving her away, signalling the end of the conversation. “As long as Lena Luthor’s fall from grace is spectacular.”

x

Kara doesn’t want to do this. She really doesn’t want to do this.

(She isn’t quite sure any job is worth so many lies, so much deceit.

Then again, she does work for the DEO….)

“Quit,” Alex suggests for the umpteenth time, her eyes following Kara as she paces in the living room. “Just leave CatCo.”

“And never write again? I can’t do that.”

“Then go back and tell her you don’t want the story.”

“Then I’m stuck writing stupid pieces and I’ll never be a real journalist.”

“Kara—”

“Alex, I don’t want to do this, but I have to.” Kara pauses, looks at her sister, waits for her to do something other than return her gaze with wide eyes. “Alex?” Kara prods when Alex merely hugs a pillow to her chest, sinking deeper into the couch.

“What do you want me to say? You’ve made up your mind.”

“Lena Luthor won’t even be interested in me, so I’ll go tomorrow and then just tell Andrea that I failed.”

“That’s a good point,” Alex says, but there’s hesitance in her tone.

“What?”

“Well, don’t get mad, but what if she does like you? I mean, you’re almost annoyingly likeable. James liked you, Winn liked you, Lucy liked you, even Cat Grant like—”

“—I get it, Alex.”

“I don’t know what the right answer is,” Alex continues unhelpfully before she gets up and stops Kara’s pacing, taking her hands gently and squeezing them briefly before pulling her into a tight hug. “But whatever you choose, I’ll have your back. Like always.”

“The Danvers sisters,” Kara mutters into her sister’s ear.

“—we should come with a warning,” Alex finishes, grinning as she pulls away and studies Kara’s face. “Now let’s eat and do some research on your soon to be girlfriend.”

“Alex.”

(Her admonishment falls on deaf ears though—Alex just laughs in response.)

x

When Andrea had mentioned an “entry-level” job, Kara had imagined it was something in HR or a position as someone’s assistant. She had not, not even for a second, imagined that Andrea would bother looking at her resume and fit her in one of the many labs at L-Corp.

“Frankly, Dr. Danvers,” says Jess, the woman who’d taken her for a tour around the lab, taking care to have Kara sign NDAs before she mentioned any of L-Corps many projects, “you’re vastly overqualified for the position you applied for. I mean, you’ll be a glorified lab tech—are you sure that’s what you’re looking for?”

(Kara sighs internally, realizing that Andrea hadn’t looked at her resume, she’d just pushed Kara into the first opening L-Corp had.)

“It’s just Kara. And honestly, yes.” At Jess’s skeptical look, Kara clears her throat and tries again. “Working here, in any capacity, would be a dream come true. L-Corp is an incredible force for good. I just want to be a part of it.” It’s not a lie, Kara tells herself as Jess smiles approvingly at the answer. In fact, it’s the most honest thing she’s said to Jess since stepping inside the building and introducing herself.

It’s just that...well….

She wishes she could’ve been a part of such a force for good without an ulterior motive hanging over her head.

“Speaking of dreams,” she continues as Jess leads her down another hallway, pointing out current research and scientists, “I’ve always wanted to meet Lena Luthor. Is there any chance a lowly tech like me would be able to meet her one day?”

Jess laughs as she comes to a halt in front of the elevators. “The chances are actually quite high,” she says, gesturing for Kara to enter the small enclosed space. “Ms. Luthor spends a great deal of time in the labs herself. But I’m afraid she’s not in National City at the moment, so it may be some time before you see her.”

“Oh really? Away for business?”

Jess grins and leans towards Kara conspiratorially, “A romantic getaway, actually. If you ask me, she deserves the time off. Though I doubt the Board will be happy if they ever found out.” She laughs and shrugs. “CEO running off for pleasure isn’t the greatest for business if you know what I mean.”

“...right,” Kara manages, frowning and feeling the sudden need to step away from Jess. She’s no stranger to being the assistant to someone as powerful as Lena Luthor and all the secrets one became privy to due to that position—after all, Cat Grant was nothing if not full of secrets and mystery—but the key to any good assistant was keeping their mouth shut.

Kara suddenly feels immeasurably sorry for Lena. If the person closest to her at work feels so at ease in betraying her confidence in this way...Lena really is in need of someone to protect her.

The elevator comes to a lurching stop (though Kara thinks part of that is her imagination due to the guilt pooling in her belly), and the doors slide open. She follows Jess to the entrance of the building, where she’s introduced to the security guards and given a keycard. When it’s all done, Jess crosses her arms over her chest and smiles at Kara warmly.

“Well. I suppose I’ll see you tomorrow,” she says, some sort of undercurrent to her tone that puts Kara on edge.

And as Kara leaves L-Corp, she wonders just what kind of insanity Andrea got her into.

x

Nearly a month passes by, Kara becoming more and more incensed at the way Lena’s employees talk about her each day. The rumors that fly around about the CEO are wild, unsubstantiated, and incredibly embarrassing. There’s chatter about Lena’s sex life, her family, her hobbies, and even one nasty suggestion that there’s one secret lab in the basement that’s used solely to experiment on aliens in a continuation of Lex’s work.

(Kara had, of course, checked every nook and cranny of the building as Supergirl, so she knows it’s not true.

And it’s maddening to hear employees repeat such vile lies, seemingly only to the new lab tech.)

It comes to a head one afternoon when she’s taking her lunch break, sitting alone at one of the tables outside the building. Just as she’s biting into her sandwich, two researchers who work in the lab adjacent to hers walk by, whispering loudly about how Lena’s credibly accused of murder.

“You’re both ridiculous,” Kara snaps at them, getting up from her chair so violently that it’s thrown to the ground with a loud clatter. It attracts one of the security guards, and he ambles over quickly. “Lena Luthor has done nothing to deserve such hateful talk, and you all should be ashamed of yourselves,” she hisses at the others milling about, staring at her with a strange expression. “If you don’t like her, then quit. Why are you here?”

“Dr. Danvers,” the security guard—Peter—says, picking up her chair and then gently taking her elbow, “if you could come with me.”

“Pete,” one of the researchers who caused Kara’s outburst suddenly pipes up, “take her to Jess. Tell her the experiment was a success.”

“The experiment? What—”

“Dr. Danvers, if you could just follow me,” Peter repeats, smiling genially at her, waiting for her to nod. He motions for her to head towards the elevator, and he starts chatting amicably, but Kara’s attention is on the bright smiles of the employees she’d just shouted at. She doesn’t understand—was something bad about to happen? Was it time to call Alex and the DEO? Did Andrea really send her into something dangerous?

Peter claps her on the back when the get to the very top floor, leaving her with Jess and a quick good luck. Jess, for her part, is no longer the smiling, cheerful, chatty assistant Kara met the day she got her job.

“For the record,” Jess tells her as she moves towards what clearly must be Lena’s office, knocking on the door twice and pushing it open at the soft come in from behind the wood, “I still don’t trust you, even if the experiment was a success.”

“Wha—”

“Ms. Luthor is waiting for you.”

Jess all but shoves Kara forward, and then there’s nothing separating Kara from Lena Luthor except a large white desk stacked with papers and a laptop that clicks shut the moment Lena meets her gaze.

“Kara Danvers,” she says, getting to her feet gracefully and holding out her hand. “It’s nice to finally meet you. I’m sure you have questions.”

x

Somewhere, across the city, Kara can hear the pounding of keys on a piano, of a woman cursing under her breath as she gets a papercut, of a child’s laugh. Somewhere, across the city, there’s Alex’s reassuring, steady heartbeat, pounding in Kara’s ears. And yet, despite all that, the silence in Lena’s office is deafening.

“You seem shocked, Ms. Danvers,” Lena says with a smirk, one eyebrow raised. “You don’t mean to tell me you believed those rumors you didn’t sell to the press, did you?”

“Kara,” she automatically corrects, swallowing when this just makes Lena’s eyebrow rise further. “Call me Kara.”

“All right, Kara. Do sit down, we have a lot to talk about. You’re vastly overqualified as a tech and I was hoping—”

“—wait,” Kara interrupts, holding up one hand, the other fidgeting with her glasses. “Can we just, um, rewind for a second? What’s—what’s going on? What’s the ‘experiment?’”

Lena sighs, looking almost disappointed in the question.

“I’m an extremely unpopular woman, Kara. I also happen to be quite wealthy and in charge of one of the most influential companies in the world. Everything I do, from what I wear to where I go, is scrutinized and reported on. Excessively.” She sits down, pausing long enough that Kara’s brain kicks into gear and she does as well, sitting on the literal edge of her seat as she waits for Lena to continue, guilt eating away at her. “I’ve had people fake resumes, references, anything, to get a job here just to get a story. So Jess—my assistant, very clever and far too good to me—came up with the experiment. When a particularly suspicious application, such as yours, comes in, we inundate you with false stories. If any of them leak, well. Needless to say, there’s legal action taken. You signed quite a few NDAs, I do hope you read them all carefully.” Her eyes sparkle as she makes the joke, and despite Kara’s guilt (knowing she’s at L-Corp to do the very thing Lena and her employees are trying so hard to combat), she can’t help but marvel at Lena Luthor.

(She’s, in a word, beautiful.

She’s clever, well-spoken, charming, and so gentle, and it breaks Kara’s heart a little.)

“Why let me through the front doors if my application was suspicious?”

“Well, even if we thought you were too good to be true, we wanted to be sure. There’s one project in particular I think you’d be a perfect fit for—” Lena starts to dig through one of the stacks on her desk, and suddenly Kara can’t take the guilt anymore.

“You should fire me,” she all but shouts, getting to her feet. Lena leans back in shock, clearly perplexed.

“Pardon?”

“I’m not who you think I am—I mean, I am, because that resume is real but I’m not.” Kara’s hands instinctively go to her glasses, fiddling with them as she tries to figure out her next words.

“You need to speak slower,” Lena says, her shock slowly being replaced by something cold and hard. “And far more clearly. Explain.”

(It’s said as an order, and Kara knows it is because it is an order.)

“I am Kara Danvers. And everything on that resume is true. I was good at school.” Good at school is an understatement, but she figures right now is not the time to brag about her academic achievements on Krypton. Rao, Earth science is so easy in comparison. “But I’m not a researcher, and I’m not here to help L-Corp do good, though I wish I was.”

“Then what do you do?” Lena asks, tone dangerous.

“I’m a cub reporter,” Kara admits breathlessly. “At CatCo. Worldwide Media?”

“Yes, I’ve heard of it,” Lena bites out sarcastically. “Continue.”

“Our new Editor-In-Chief, Andrea Rojas, she um. Well, she wants a story. And she sent me here to get it. Probably because of my background in science, now that I think about it. She forced me into an impossible choice, take this assignment or never write anything real, and I was forcing myself to do it because I want to be a journalist, but a month here and I just can’t. I can’t. I don’t want to ruin any of this so please. Please just fire me.” She ends her ramble by literally snapping her mouth shut, looking at Lena apprehensively.

“And what exactly was the story? My technology? Is she trying to sabotage my work?”

“Um. Well, no? You’re the story. I was,” Kara blushes hard, hating herself for the words she forces out next, “I was supposed to get to you. Become your, um, bodyguard.”

Shockingly, Lena just...laughs.

“You mean to tell me that my best friend from boarding school sent you, a woman with an impressive resume—” far more than impressive, Kara thinks to herself, half of her accomplishments weren’t even listed on it “—but literally zero ability to lie, to try to seduce me and get a story?”

“Yep,” Kara says, popping the ‘p,’ wondering just how much Lena Luthor would eat her words if she knew about Kara’s ability to keep Supergirl secret, “that’s it in a nutshell. So if you could just fire me now, I’d—”

“Fire you?” Lena shakes her head. “I’m not going to fire you. I wasn’t lying, I need someone with your talents. And while you’re working in the lab, I’ll help you with a story you can give to Andrea that will save your job and be beneficial to me.”

“Right, okay,” Kara responds slowly. “And the bodyguard thing….” She trails off, unsure how to phrase her question.

“I’m afraid that’s out of the question,” Lena says smoothly. “Besides, it seems Andrea doesn’t know me as well as she thought, you’re not exactly my type.”

For whatever reason, even though Kara is relieved that she won’t have to fake a relationship, Lena’s words still sting. Smartly. Powerfully.

“Right, right,” she says, ducking her head and hoping she’s hiding her flushed cheeks and hurt, “I’m not—I’m not even gay, so. That’s, um, good.”

(And months down the line, Kara will think back to the moment they make eye contact, as they make plans to meet the next morning and discuss everything in more detail, and she’ll remember the swoop in her belly that replaced the guilt churning away there, and she’ll realize that was the first moment she started to fall for Lena Luthor.)  

x

She’s seen in public with Lena Luthor once, once, and suddenly it’s all anyone can talk about.

Contrary to what Andrea thinks when Kara meets her for their obligatory clandestine check-in on the progress of the ‘story,’ it’s not that their nefarious plot to get some sort of embarrassing admission from Lena is working. Not even close. The only reason they land in the tabloids is because Kara just happened to be leaving L-Corp late one night (after a grueling day of research, frustrated by this planet’s backwards and practically obsolete understanding of science), coincidentally around the same time Lena chose to go home, bumping into the CEO awkwardly before clearing her throat and holding the door open for the woman who was—for all intents and purposes—her boss.

Not that that matters to any of the trashy magazines that publish the photo taken of them, pointing to a non-existent blush on Lena’s cheeks, to Kara’s mussed hair, to some sort of imagined “gaze” that Kara apparently bestowed on the second most powerful woman in National City. (Cat Grant always has been, and always will be no matter where she is in the world, the most powerful woman to Kara.)

Does Lena Luthor have a new gal pal?

Lena Luthor’s secret fling!

Caught in the act! Lena Luthor’s new lover!

The headlines make Kara cringe.

(She hates it. Even if Alex laughs away when she hears about it and Andrea sends her a congratulatory email and a renewed promise to let her write about whatever “stupid political story” Kara wants.

Kara hates it so much.)

The headlines are awful, so Kara thinks she’s understandably stressed when she’s called to Lena’s office the very next day.

(This is it, she’s going to be fired.

She’s just going to go back to writing about dresses and fashion shows and not the blatant discrimination in the juvenile criminal justice system and the pervasiveness of corruption and racism in sentencing.)

Except, all her dread about dresses is for naught because when she enters Lena’s office, Lena isn’t seething with rage or even cold with disinterest (as she’d been with Kara since finding out about the whole ‘I’m a journalist’ thing). No, Lena is smiling.

“You know what’s remarkable?” she tells Kara as she motions for her to sit down and offers a water that Kara quickly refuses. “I’ve been in this city for years. I’ve donated millions, developed dozens of new technologies to help people, practically took over the National City Children’s Hospital from a bunch of greedy men in suits in order to save lives, and even owned one of the biggest media companies in the world for a hot minute, but this is the best press day I’ve had since Lex dragged our name through the mud.”

Kara, who’s ready with an apology on her lips, frowns, not quite understanding. “You’re not upset? About the photo?”

“I mean, the photo is ridiculous,” Lena waves her comment off, though Kara can hear the tiny bump up in her heart rate, giving away the lie, “but because of the photo, people are asking about my philanthropic work, about the STEM scholarships I offer to young girls that no one applies to anymore because of the name attached to it, about the climate change efforts L-Corp has made.” She smiles widely, leaning against her desk and looking at Kara in a way that Kara feels distinctly uncomfortable with—like she’s prey, like she’s to be devoured, like she’s been caught in a trap. “Who knew all it would take for people to ignore my last name is a pretty blonde woman smiling as she holds the door open for me?”

(Kara tries not to blush at the ‘pretty’ comment, she really does, but she doesn’t think she’s successful. Lena’s smile becomes a smirk and Kara finds herself ducking her head, fiddling with her glasses.)

“Well, I’m glad I could help, Ms. Luthor.”

“Lena.”

“Sorry?”

“It’s Lena. From now on,” the CEO says, still smiling. “I think I owe you an apology, Kara.”

“I—for what?”

“For tossing out the bodyguard idea so quickly.” Lena pauses, rolls her eyes, and shakes her head. “I mean, that’s entirely ludicrous, I’m not going to ask a journalist to put herself in the line of fire, but I think being seen together, every now and then, in public, isn’t the worst thing that could happen.”

“I’m sorry, I think I must have misunderstood—are you...are you asking that I pretend to go on dates with you?”

“Yes, exactly,” Lena says brightly, as if the whole thing has been decided. “Nice to see you’re paying attention,” she continues, her tone light and almost flirty and Kara’s dealt with a lot in her life but she decides then and there that this is the worst whiplash she’s ever gotten. “I know on Tuesdays you have your supposedly secret meetings with Andrea about the progress of your story, so how are your Wednesdays?”

Lena’s knowledge of the ‘secret’ meetings is somehow the least surprising part of everything that’s been said since Kara stepped into her office.

“My Wednesdays?”

“Yes, for our weekly lunches from now on,” Lena says, looking amused by Kara’s expression.

“I mean, um, Wednesdays are fine.”

“Great. I’ll text you the details.”

Kara doesn’t even ask how Lena has her cell number. She just nods, her only thought that she needs to find Alex—and quick.

x

“Do you think it’s lying?” Kara asks her sister and friends from where she’s floating, arms crossed over her chest, staring intently at the ceiling as though the answers would be written there. “I’m a journalist—is it unethical to be misleading the public this way?”

Nia snorts from where she sits, covering her laugh up with a cough when Kara floats down to the ground just to glare.

“I think you’re overthinking this,” Alex says, just as Nia offers a mumbled: “Who says you’re misleading anyone?”

Alex and Nia look at each other with conspiratorial grins, and even though Kelly sighs, she looks vaguely amused. Only J’onn and Brainy seem just as confused as Kara.

“I don’t understand,” Kara says, looking at her sister and friend with a frown.

“It’s like this,” Nia explains slowly, looking to Alex for support, “you’ve talked about Lena Luthor a lot lately, you know?”

“Well, yeah. She’s my boss.”

“No, Kara,” Alex chuckles, “you talk and think about her a lot. Do you see what we mean?” J’onn’s expression clears into understanding and he smiles, nodding along. Even Brainy, who had been sitting with a frown, now has his hands clasped together in front of him, nodding along with Alex and Nia. Finally, it’s Kelly who takes pity on Kara.

“I think what they’re trying to say is that you have a little crush on Lena Luthor,” Kelly explains, holding up a hand when Kara immediately starts to deny it. “Even if you don’t like her in a romantic sense, you certainly like her. Just...take these lunches one day at a time. Think of it as making a new friend rather than a pretend date if you have to.”

“Or,” Nia says with a laugh, “you could save everyone a lot of time and just tell Lena Luthor you have a thing for her and want the pretend dates to be real dates.” At Kara’s shocked look, she held up her hands. “But you do you, obviously!”

x

The article comes out just a few months later.

Before the poorly written, gossipy, nonsense riddled article ruins everything, things finally settle enough that Kara thinks she can actually do this. Her weekly lunches with Lena are enjoyable and fun, the two of them spending several hours chatting about science, life, and causes they are passionate about. In fact, they begin to see each other outside the weekly lunches too, and not just on planned out “events” meant to give the press something to talk about. (Lena comes to game night and Kara goes with Lena to her father’s grave on the anniversary of his death to provide moral support, where there are no cameras or ulterior motive.) In between all the pretend dates, they spend time together for real, bonding over being adopted and a mutual love for Big Belly Burger. Together, they attempt to brainstorm ideas of what pitch Kara could give to Andrea that would secure her job and help Lena with the media.

And it’s...refreshing. It’s nice. It’s something Kara rarely gets to experience.

With Lena, all she is is Kara. With Lena, she can let her guard down a little, can avoid dumbing herself down, and just talk—like she did with her parents, or other members of the Science Guild. And Kara knows Lena is slightly curious about her—she’s made a few comments about it—but she lets it go in order to continue their discussions on the latest project, on a problem that’s cropped up, on potential solutions.

(It’s rare, this thing she has with Lena. It’s rare for humans to be able to keep up with her, and it’s rare that she doesn’t have to slow down for them.

It’s even rarer for someone to be so casual about just how intelligent they are—to keep up easily and to treat it as though it’s not a big deal, as though it’s all just normal talk.

And Kara likes it, enjoys it, doesn’t want it to end. She has this with Alex or Eliza or Brainy, but with Lena there’s something else—a challenge, a give and take, a back and forth that leaves her breathless and wanting for more.

With Lena, it’s electric.)

It’s going well, much better than it should be, considering all of Kara’s initial misgivings and guilt (and the realization—as she and Lena move from ‘business partners’ as Lena calls it to legitimate friends—that soon Supergirl has to come out to Lena). It’s going well enough that Kara should’ve expected it, should’ve known something would come along and ruin everything.

Lena Luthor’s New Gal Pal Has Never Been Kissed!

Is Something Wrong With Luthor? New Girlfriend Wants ZERO Kisses, Sources Say!

The L in L-Corp Definitely Does Not Stand For Love: Lena Luthor’s New Relationship Destined to Fail!

“Of course the good press wasn’t meant to last. Apparently, you’ve never been kissed,” Lena says the Wednesday after the articles are first published. They’re in her office today, which was where they had lunch every day the past week, something Kara had decided was best not to bring up, lest it didn’t mean what she hoped it meant.

“Oh, well, um, I haven’t actually,” Kara says through a mouthful of sushi.

Lena blinks, looking taken aback. “You haven’t?” she asks, sounding as though she thinks this is a joke. “But you’re—I mean, look at you. Why?”

(Kara doesn’t exactly like this question.

For one, it implies there’s something wrong with her, something broken, mirroring her own thoughts on the issue. For another—and much more importantly—explaining why would take explaining how she landed on this planet, how it took her years to feel comfortable with humans, how it takes time for her to even want that sort of intimacy from someone else, how she hasn’t yet felt the urge or the need or the desire, and any of those people she thought she may one day feel that way for had slipped out of her life before they got to that point.)

Perhaps it’s because Kara doesn’t respond right away, or perhaps it’s just because Lena is better at reading her than Kara gives her credit for, but almost immediately after the question escapes Lena’s lips, she blushes and shakes her head. “I’m so sorry,” she says, reaching out slowly enough that Kara has time to pull away if she wants to, gently taking Kara’s hand and swiping her thumb over the back of it when Kara doesn’t move, “that was crass and rude of me. It’s none of my business. You have every right to live your life the way you want to.”

“You don’t think it’s strange?”

“No,” Lena replies with zero hesitation. When Kara fixes her with a look, she chuckles, swiping her thumb over the back of Kara’s hand once more. It does something funny to Kara’s chest. “I admit, I’m surprised. But that’s just my own bias, you know?” She starts to move her thumb back and forth, almost as if she doesn’t know she’s doing it. “Just because someone’s life experiences are different from my own doesn’t make it any better or worse. It’s your life, Kara. No one is allowed to tell you how to live it.” She bites her lip, and Kara squeezes Lena’s hand gently, knowing what Lena wants to ask.

“I’m waiting,” she explains softly, not meeting Lena’s eyes. “For someone who’d wait for me to want it. Does that make sense?”

Lena likely senses that the topic isn’t something Kara wants to get deeper into, because she clears her throat and moves bravely on. “Since I chose lunch today, I suppose you could pick tomorrow, but Kara, I’m not willing to have potstickers again, it’s not—”

“—what are we going to do about the story?” Kara interrupts, listening to the way Lena’s heart rate increases, the way she’s trying to hide her stress. “There are a few articles that make fun of you because of me.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Lena waves her off, shifting on the couch so that she and Kara were sitting shoulder to shoulder. “It’ll blow over soon.”

“But the whole point of this in the first place was to give you good press. And because of me—”

“—because of you, what? People associate me as the girlfriend of a beautiful woman instead of my homicidal brother? How terrible of you,” Lena says, narrowing her eyes playfully, and smiling at Kara. It’s clear she wants to talk about something else, but it feels wrong to brush past this.

“Lena, please,” Kara tries, and shockingly, Lena deflates. She gives in so easily, and Kara’s not exactly sure how she managed that.

“We could get Jess to leak that we’ve been affectionate behind closed doors, and we just don’t like doing so in public.”

“It’s one thing to let the press come to its own conclusions, but I can’t lie, Lena,” Kara immediately disagrees. She watches with interest and Lena ducks her head, mumbling something about integrity affectionately under her breath, before she turns back to Kara with a raised eyebrow.

“Well, you could always just go for it.”

“What?”

“You could just kiss me.”

(Kara’s heart thumps in her chest, and she can’t do much other than swallow hard.

She realizes, suddenly, that her hand is still in Lena’s, that their fingers have become intertwined, that Lena’s thumb is still stroking the back of Kara’s hand.)

“Lena, I want it to mean something.”

(This is it, Kara thinks. This is the moment Lena will laugh and say it’s all a joke.

This is the moment, Kara thinks. This is the moment that she’ll have her heart broken.)

“I know,” Lena says, turning fully so that she’s facing Kara, one leg folded under her, her free hand reaching out to tuck a stray lock of hair behind Kara’s ear. “I’ll wait, however long you want me to.”

“Wait. What?”

Lena smiles, something impossibly vulnerable in her eyes. “I don’t want this to be fake anymore,” she says softly, but quickly, as if she can’t bear to bare it all, and yet can’t stop herself from doing so anyway. “I want to go on dates. To celebrate with you when you get your huge break. To hold your hand,” she looks down at their hands, squeezing as if to make a point. “And I’ll wait. For you. If you choose to want it too.”

“Oh,” Kara mutters, and it occurs to her in that moment that Eliza and Alex were right. She did have high standards, and Lena met them. And it did happen when she least expected it—at lunch, with someone she never even expected to become friends with, let alone something more. “You don’t have to wait.”

“What? I don't—” Lena starts to question, cut off when Kara closes the few inches of space between them.

And as far as first kisses go, Kara thinks, it was well worth the wait.

x

“How I Infiltrated L-Corp, Fell in Love With the CEO, and Had My First Kiss, by Kara Danvers,” Andrea reads aloud, grimacing as she looks up at Kara. “I can’t publish this.”

“That’s unfortunate, Ms. Rojas,” Kara says with a smile, shrugging. “You’re welcome to fire me though. But I do have a great piece on juvenile sentencing, if you want to read it.”

Andrea narrows her eyes, but then, she...laughs. “I’m a woman of my word. Send me your new piece.” Kara nods and is nearly out the door when Andrea speaks again. “And Kara? When you see Lena, tell her I said we’re even now, won’t you?”

Kara doesn’t ask or care what she means—she chalks it up to a boarding school thing and leaves it at that.  

[popculturebuffet]

The Legion of Super Heroes Reviews: The Legion of Substitute Heroes or Unsung Heroes

Happy 29th Birthday to Me! Yes it’s my birthday which means it’s time for reflection, griping about getting older and cake. And after an exausting weekend of grappling with a growth, i’m not going to go into anymore detail, I can finally, relax celebrate and get back to reviewing. And since i’ts my big day, that means I decided to dedicate today’s reviews to things that mean a hell of a lot to me and in one way or another shaped me as a person. A self indulgant way to reflect on my past, look to the future and show y’all some stuff I really like. So with that out of the way let’s talk about the Legion of Super Heroes.. and their oddball sub team I love dearly. 

This is also my first chance to talk about DC Comics on my blog. I’m honestly shocked that in the year i’ve been reviewing stuff regularly, the other half of the big two superhero comic publishers hasn’t come up. While I do tend to lean towards marvel, in part because Marvel is simply better at collecting their stuff and putting it on sale more often, it’s still the home of some of my faviorite properties: Justice League International, The Green Lanterns (Minus Hal), Teen Titans, Wonder Woman, Oracle, Batgirl (All of them, particularly Steph and Cass), Young Justice, Supergirl, my personal boy The Martian Manhunter.. the list dosen’t go on by much but it indeed goes on. I”ve been reading dc comics since I was in middle school, and I haven’t stopped since and don’t intend to stop now and maybe in the next year I can get around to tackling some of their awesome cartoons and comics more eh? But yeah among these titans, including the actual titans, are the Legion, one of the most unique and awesome super team concepts in my humble opinon and , even for DC, one of the teams with the most tangled up histories. 

First created in the Silver Age by writer Otto Binder and Artist Al Plastino, The Legion of Superheroes is DC”s first successful teen superhero team, predating the titans by a few years, though I dearly love both wildly diffrent teams. The Legion is defined by their high concept: A thousand years into the future, three super teens from diffrent worlds who happened to be on the same ship with billionare RJ Brande, saved Brande from some goons hired by his crooked buisness partner. 

And exposed him. Inspirired by their courage, heart and skill, Brande latter called the three together to form them into a super team, one inspiried by the legends of teen hero Superboy. 

No not Conner though it was nice to get to show off my poster of him. While he was part of the second continuities legion, we’ll get to that, he’s not the superboy we’re looking for. He is damn great though and it’s good to have you back bud. 

Not Jon either, though I do miss this kid’s pre-bendis version and he was the inspiration.. for another version of the legion. (SIGH). Try. AGAIN IMAGE SEARCH. 

...... 

No not the cool bad boy turned troubled good boy, not the child who was inexpciably aged up by that bald smeghead, and not the great idea turned into a editiorial mouthpiece. I”m talking about THIS superboy. 

This is where the name came from: From the silver age till crisis on infinite earths, Clark Kent was active as a kid in smallville, and thus was Superboy, superman when he was a boy. He dealt with similar stories just with Lana replacing Lois, and Luthor as a ginger teenager. And it was these deeds as a teen hero on his own, one of the first honestly, that inspiried the legion and brande and forged the team. 

And it was naturally a super boy story where they were first introduced as the legion’s founders went back to recruit Superboy after putting him through some trials, and were intended as just one of many silver age one off concepts.. but caught on with the readers so much they were brought back, and had their ranks expanded and eventually not only added supergirl, yes the one your thinking of this time, to their ranks, and yes sometimes she and superboy were in the same place at the same time, Clark willingly had founding member and telepath Saturn Girl put a mental block in his head for any info he’s not supposed to know yet so it’s cool . But yeah not only that but they eventually became their own feature in Adventure Comics, where Superboy’s stories were published, but overtook him in popularity with time.  Over time a number of distinct aspects were established: The roster eventually got as large as 20 plus legionarres, almost all from diffrent worlds, and they eventually set up bilaws. Some are silly and dated such as “Legionarres marrying means they retire” which was eventually done away with in the 70′s, but others were simple logic: each member must have a unique power, no using weapons and such which rather than be super power snobbery is so said tech dosen’t fail and the legion later fully allowed Karate Kid, a martial artist, to join, no killing.. just common sense stuff that adds to it. And one of those is the centerpiece to today’s story, which we’ll get to in a moment.  Obviously given they’ve been around since 1958, there is a LOT more to the Legion’s history I will dig into at a later date: The short version is that Crisis on Infinite Earths, Dc’s first big reboot, fucked the team up badly by retconning superboy out of existance and dc editorial made it worse by shooting down EVERY solution the team came up with to fix the issue. So eventually things got so messy they nuked the whole thing during the event Zero Hour and rebooted fresh with Mark Waid taking the helm and updating the concept for the 90′s and being a more lighthearted, if still not without weight, comic in the sea of 90′s edge. Waid would reboot the team again due to sagging sales, a far weaker reason this time, with a more rebllion slant, the original team would be reinstated, and then ended for a while before recently being rebooted by Brian Micheal Bendis... who sadly is long past his creative prime from books like Ultimate Spider-man and alias and is instead stewing in his own toilet dinner these days and thus it’s not pretty.. well okay art wise i’ts VERY pretty, it’s just story wise it sucks dirty ass in thunder storms. There was also an awesome cartoon that sadly lasted only two seasons that I will DEFINTELY be digging into, especially since unlike x-men evolution, it’s not you know 50 some episodes and me biting off way more than I can chew but a slim 26 that still has fans to this day. I”ll get into ALL OF THIS, some ohter time hopefullly and I mostly outlined it since some of you might be familiar with another version or “Sigh” the reboot and this helps clear things up.  So yeah with all that out of the way we’re going back to the silver age and the first story I ever read of hte team, how I met them with “The Legion of Substitute Heroes” and a later subs story I genuinely love. I first read this story in one dc’s old expensive archives collections I got from the library. Oh how I miss the library. Your probably wondering who the legion of susbstite heroes are.. but since the first story covers that we can jump right in after the break!

So we open with a teen in a parka uniform disembarking from a spaceship from another planet, which a passerby notes is just like the airplanes people used to ride from country to country. 

But we meet our hero, Polar Boy, whose in a winter themed outfit and has come to try out. This is the tradition I was saving for now: The Legion Tryouts. Like a club or sports team would, but I like it because it makes sense: The Legion NEEDS to be as big as it is because while their headquartered on earth, their mission scope is anywhere in the united planets which spans GALAXIES. They could be called on any time and need their full force or need to have severa l members on a smaller mission and frequently having members away on a mission was cleverly used to reduce the cast to whoever was needed for the story. 

So it only makes sense to frequently look for new membbers to help strengthen their ranks... but given their teens and are recurting teens they need to be careful and need a logical way to reduce crowd flow. I mean you saw how many people used to line up for american idol before that died a justified death, people will do anything to be famous and they need to weed out those whose powers and skill just aren’t up to snuff yet, or those who are just dicks as, unsuprisingly, several stories have been built on assholes who applied and were rejected turning evil and attacking.. even though the Legion wasn’t even paticuarlly harsh. They also are more than fair as applicants CAN try again or if they prove themselves in other ways can be let in, as Bouncing Boy, my favoirite legionarre, was intially rejected for his power of .. well...

Yeah.. on paper inflating like a ball and bouncing around is kind of silly. In practice he can ricochet off enemies, walls, and obstacles and is fairly durable in that state. It’s why I don’t really brook mocking the guys power: yes it’s goofy.. but say that again when he hands you his ass. It’s the same with matter eater lad who yes is an actual character: While being able to eat anything is gloriously goofy.. it means he can chew through ANY substance and digest ANYTHING. Hell in the cartoon episode intorducing the subs they used both of these guys to great efffect: Bouncing Boy, who in the cartoon had to try out multiple times in his backstory, encouraged the future subs while Matter Eater Lad got in by EATING A FUCKING BOMB. He also had shades which I dind’t know he was missing but now I do. My point is the process is fair and well thought out and leads to some really fun scenes. 

But yeah joining the legion is naturally Polar Boy’s dream, as he walks down the avenue of heroes, basically a series of statues honoring the legion and hopes all his hard work paid off. We then cut to the auditions, where he apparently waited all night. What I like about this story is that unusually for the silver age legion where it was mostly a sea of powers attached to a bunch of cardboard, really the dc silver age in a nutshell and why marvel broke out so much for having more dynamic and realistic characters, Polar Boy has more of a personality. It’s not MUCH but he’s a dedicated, hard working kid who just wants to join his heroes and seems really in awe of htem, a feeling we can all relate to. We’ve all had people we’ve looked up to, admired, and we’ve all had groups we wanted to join as kids, teens or what have you. And of course.. we all know what it’s like to be rejected by someone or something you badly wanted to be a part of.  And that’s what happens to poor polar boy, who comes from a world with an intense sun thus his people developed super cold powers.. but he can’t control them well so while their impressive, they also freeze the legion. HIs powers are good... but due to their strength and radius he’s also a liablility. They give him an consolation anti-gravity belt.. they had these before eventually compressing them into the much cooler flight rings.. which I still desperatly want one of. I have the flash’s costume ring and a green lantern corps ring, but still no legion ring. 

Naturally this devistates the poor boy and he wonders around dispondent till nightfall, convinced he’ll never be one of them. He soon meets Night Girl, a fellow reject with super strength given to her by her dad’s formula.. but only in darkness as she’s from a world without sunlight. She also faces a “hopeless future” but it’s then Polar Boy’s true strength reveals itself: he decides screw giving up on their dream and if they can’t be in the legion they’ll start their own Legion. 

Though not to compete but to serve as a subtistute, in case the legion is ever incapacitated. So Night Girl gathers the other rejects the next morning. Cleverly one of them, Chlorophyll Kid was seen with Night Girl herslef at the tryouts behind Polar Boy. We soon learn about them and each of their origins: Stone Boy can turn himself into an immobile stone statue, as his world has half a year long nights and thus his people hybernate, Fire Lad who can spit hot fire literally and set anything combustable on fire and Chlorphyll Kid who can make plants grow rapidly. Each were rejected for resonable powers: Stone Boys powers too static, Fire Lad’s is too dangerous and Chorlpyl Kids toos pecific. But upon seeing all of this Polar Boy says they STILL have fantastic powers and still can help people and the legion. 

Thus the Legion of Substittue Heroes is born. And I love them as much as the originals. As a bit of a misfit myself I relate to these guys: They have strange specific powers, got rejected by the big team.. while that trope is nothing new at the time it was unique and even now it’s a nice and inspiring message. Instead of giving up they form their OWN team to do what htey can anyway. They might not be the best like the legion but they can still help and still do what’s right even if not on their scale. It’s a great concept and really makes them endearing. Again I have a thing for the underdogs but I still really like these guys. It’s why it annoys me they got kind of spat on with time: While I love Keith Giffen and Paul Levitz run on the legion, and feel it’s the best of that contnuinty it’s not without fault and the two basically spent a full issue mocking the team and split polar boy off from them before making their own subs with only ONE of the originals. It just felt.. disrspectful. And so far no continuity has used them again until the recent bendis run, which has them announced for the Future Slate special. It took BENDIS, who dosen’t get how to use the team properly and is up his own ass, to bring them back in a new continuity and I find that obnoxious. The subs are a great concept and deserve to be honored as such and as such are one of my favorite superhero teams. 

But their careers don’t start well as they doubt themslves, except for Polar Boy who boisters them along, and constnatly just end up going to missions the legion already has covered and when the legion go to fight some robot ships, they refuse the subs help.. which is fair though, as Brainy puts it they can’t risk putting untrained volunteers in harms way. Their about to just quit, in a really sad moment.. when CK, because I can’t spell cholophill and hate having to use spell check notices some odd seeds spread about.. and when he grows one a horrifying tree man shows up. They struggle with it till the setting son finishes it’s job, meaning Night Girl is at full power and whollops it and the subs spend the night destroying the seeds.  They  find out the next day the seeds came from the same planet as the robot ships, meaning the ships are a distraction for whoevers doing this and since they can’t just call earth, as the full force of the legion is needed with the robots and all it’d do is cause a panic, it’s down to them. Night Girl however is scared.. and I like that. It shows that while their regaining their confidence.. it’s sitll risky. Their a bunch of barely trained fanboys, and girl, going up against an alien invasion, with it down to them. They CAN save the world but it’s alright to be entirely terrified when your thrust into it this fast. 

They make their way to the planet, having built a ship earlier and lie low, finding out what’s going on: The plant men are fully intellegent, and grow themselves..though how they know to attack and go to the bathrom and what not out of the seed I don’t know but I assume it’s a genetic thing or they might be some form of hive mind. point is the seed plan is to grow troops all over the world via rockets for an invasion, and it’s a brilliant concept for one too. Aliens who simply GROW the troops right into battle, born with the knowledge to do so, and right where they can ambush them. It’s down to our heroes and Stone Boy, whose been the most pesemistic, valiantly dives in to provide a distraction so they can destroy the factory and the seeds. Turns out he is useful as the most the treeple have is a space lead pipe.. yes really. I love the silver age. But they’ll bring ray guns soon, so Stone BOy knows it’s a suicide mission and now our heroes have a timer. But luckily.. our heroes are stronger than they think. Night Girl punches a way in till Night passes, while Polar Boy and Flame Lad use their powers in concert to make an opneing.. but with time running out Polar Boy finishes things by having CK grow all the seeds now they have acess.. thus exploding the planets population, destroying several cities from the number of bodies, and thu discourguing the treeple from trying again. Stone boy is able to flee with the rest of our heroes and the day is saved. 

The heroes opt not to tell the public, as to take away glory for the Legion. It’s a noble gesture.. they do DESERVE credit, but they choose not to take it, preferring to let the legion get theres for stil lsaving the world from the robots. They stand firm, now confident they may someday make it to the big leagues.And it’s this that really makes me love them: Thier not the strongest or best, but they try anyway for the reasons a hero should: to help people, and not for the glory. THey remain unsung heroes and are fine with that.  Eventually the Legion WOULD find out about them, but naturally instead of being dickheads about it, fully accepted them, even offering them some contests for membership, but that’s a story for another day. THey’d remain stalwart allies and valuable backup in crisis situations for years to come until the bollocks outlined above. But they’d never leave my heart and thanks to them.. the legion never left either. 

Final Thoughts:  While I do love the story for it’s personal signifigance to me, It’s stilll a really good story for the time. A bit stilted as was the style, but still good, well paced and with an endaring cast of underdogs who prove themselves in the end. It’s something diffrent from the usual clean cut ahead in life wasps these stories usually followed at the time. While the team’s still all white and all that, their outcasts and misfits who just want to help and have trouble beliving in themselves. Their a good standard to live up to.. and a good inspiration for me and my constnatly self hating self doutbing self. And I hope you enjoyed htem too.  If you’d like to comission your own review, just dm me. It’s 5 bucks for individual issues. Later days. 

[aprincessofdaxam]

So here's the thing. When the Supergirl S3 finale aired, I absolutely hated it. And it took me nearly a year to be willing to watch it again. Because not only was I just flat-out upset because I ship Karamel and because my two favorite characters were written off the show (although at least they have each other - wait, do you hear that sound? It’s the sound of Imra screaming from the 31st century as Mon-El and Winn drive her nuts) ...

But Mon-El’s final scene? With the speech about how for a minute he thought maybe, just maybe, this was his place? Gutted me. Absolutely gutted me. We all get set off by different things, and I kid you not, that scene gave me a wicked surprise attack of homesickness and I literally cried until 4 a.m. (sometimes I hate you and your emotive acting, Chris Wood).

(complete gifset from @the-karamel-blob here)

But you know what, a year down the pike? I don't hate it. Don’t get me wrong. I'm still pretty bitter about the Karamel bait-and-switch, I still miss our outer space stray puppy terribly, and I call total BS on the "it was always a two-year arc" thing, but I actually think it was a really beautiful and meaningful send-off for Mon-El in that moment.

And anyway, it's been awhile since I've written a literal essay about Mon-El and our space puppies so LET'S CHAT. Novel on the S3 finale beneath the cut, for dash prettiness.

(also included: Why I still think Karamel is endgame, why I think Mon-El will be back, what I really think went down behind the scenes, and what Winn's appearance in S5 might mean)

Tagging @peggystormborn and @facepalming-since-chernobyl because why the heck not, you all like character/plot analysis

When Kara first creates her superhero identity, she spends a LOT of time comparing herself to Clark. And others also compare her to Clark - and she internalizes all of it.

"What, Metropolis gets him, and what does National City get? Some rookie superhero?"

"It's funny - that was the first thing he did. Save a plane, I mean."

"If she's anything like him, she's a hero."

"What are you waiting for? Superman would've blown it out by now!"

"Why do you keep criticizing Supergirl for trying to save the city? When Superman started, it was he, he, he. Him, him, him."

"My cousin didn't have a get-out-of-jail-free card when he first started. Neither should I!"

"I was supposed to be the one saving him, not the other way around. How am I supposed to really become a hero if Superman has to keep saving me?"

"If I was in Metropolis, Clark and I could protect the city and keep each other safe. And there's still so much I want to learn from him."

Now, this isn't about whether it's valid to compare Kara to Clark, or about the layers of problems that come in when you start comparing women to men - that's a whole other essay. It's about Kara's feelings, how Kara defines being a hero, and the standard she feels she needs to live up to as a hero. And since this show is built around Kara, Kara's standard for heroism become the show's definition of it, and the standards the other characters in the show should be held to in their various pursuits of goodness in the world, as well.

And that creates a very interesting comparison between Kara's arc through the first two seasons of the show (S1-S2) and Mon-El's arc in the two seasons he's appeared in thus far (S2-S3).

When Kara starts out in her journey, at the start of S1, she is in this headspace where she is constantly comparing herself to Clark. But she learns so much and accomplishes so much and shows so much strength, that by the end of S2, they have moved her to this point in her hero's journey where she is Clark's equal or superior - not only in terms of physical strength (when she defeats him after Rhea brainwashes him with silver K), but in emotional strength, as she chooses the greater good over her own personal self when she has to let Mon-El go. And her status at that point is by Clark's own admission - the person she was trying to live up to all that time.

"I think it goes far beyond 'the right thing.' I couldn't have done it, Kara. I'm humbled by you. Yeah, I'd like to think that if it came down to a choice between Lois and the world .... but I don't think I could."

So how does that relate to Mon-El's journey? Because there are a lot of parallels between Kara's hard decision at the end of S2, and his hard decision at the end of S3. And if, at the end of S2, we're supposed to see Kara as a fully-realized hero, a true champion, then that's how he's sent off as well (I'd definitely argue that Mon-El showed brave and heroic qualities even in S2, even while on a steep learning curve, but go with me here, because the parallel is really meaningful when you get to it)

Just as Kara held Clark up as her bar for being a hero, Mon-El holds Kara up as his ideal and his definition of a hero when he starts off on his journey - to the point where he eventually founds the Legion in her image.

"And whether we're together or not, being near her, it makes me a better person. It makes me the person that I want to be."

"I think we could all stand to be a little more like you. More optimistic and brave."

"I mean, you do that every day. I don't even understand it. You make it look so easy to do the right thing that you wouldn't even guess that it's that hard. But it's hard. You sacrifice a lot for everyone else, and I know I'm beginning to sound like a broken record here, but I admire you.

"I promise I'm going to be the man that you thought I could be. I promise."

You inspired me. So when I founded the Legion, I chose to use you as an example of what we could be. Of what we aspire to be."

"We base the entire philosophy of the Legion on Supergirl. Have you considered that she might have the right approach here?"

And just as Kara faces that harsh decision at the end of S2 that she needs to give Mon-El up for the greater good, Mon-El faces an identical decision at the end of S3. And, just like Kara (who made a decision Superman himself says he couldn't have made, who is a true champion), Mon-El makes that hard call.

And just as Clark told Kara when she made that hard call that he was humbled by her, validating her admiration of him, Kara gives Mon-El her hero's blessing of his decision, too. Now, I don't think these writers are particularly clever or good at continuity :P But they use the word "admire" so consistently between Karamel that I have to believe it's a deliberate choice. Mon-El tells Kara throughout S2, as he's learning, how much he admires her. And his journey takes him to a place where Kara is able to return that word to him, sincerely and meaningfully.

"There wasn't much to inspire me on Daxam." "What about the prince?" "He wasn't worth admiring. But I wanna be."

"I mean, you do that every day. I don't even understand it. You make it look so easy, to do the right thing that you wouldn't even guess that it's that hard. But it's hard. You sacrifice a lot for everyone else and I know I'm beginning to sound like a broken record here but I admire you."

"You wouldn't be the man you are, if you did. The man I admire so much."

(Tacking on to this because there’s plenty of other things to read and link to here - there was an excellent discussion we had a long time ago about Kara’s emotions and reactions during this scene where @emarasmoak and @i-am-aci01 had some great catches)

The other thing that strikes me as a parallel between Kara and Mon-El in those two season finales is the dissonance between the two of them, who have made the hard, heroic choices, and everyone else.

At the end of S2, everyone seems happy except Kara, who proceeds to isolate herself. Alex and Maggie get engaged. J'onn and M'gann are (temporarily) together. Winn and James are currently successful in their vigilante superhero forays. Clark goes home to Lois.

And at the end of S3? Mostly, our characters are happy. Kara says she's decided where her true home is, but knows her mother is safe. Winn is setting off to the future, where he knows he's important and needed. Imra has her sister back. Alex has her new role and plans to pursue parenthood. J'onn has lost his father, but is setting off on his new path. James reveals himself as Guardian. And Mon-El makes a decision out of duty that guts him. @sweeter-than put it very well: "Everyone else in this episode got an optimistic season’s end coda. Meanwhile, Mon-El is leaving the love of his life to go fight a dangerous war. ... [He] is the only character framed as being separated from his ideal destiny, where the destiny and the obligation have no middle ground."

Now we've talked about what this show wanted to tell us here. Are they saying you can't have it all - which, in Kara's case, is an inherently more complicated discussion because she's a woman? That heroes are always doomed to sacrifice? That work-life balance is a joke?

I think what's MORE IMPORTANT though, and the real message, is what Cat tells Kara (and hell, the title of the S2 finale itself). It applies in both cases. It really applies.

"You, my dear, are on a hero's journey. And yes, you have hit an obstacle, but you will soar right over it."

That's the message.

MOVING ON!

.....

I think that applying that statement to Mon-El is part of why I feel so strongly that his story isn't over yet. Because he's on a hero's journey. The story the show was telling with this character was someone evolving into a hero, someone who is a sympathetic character, someone we're supposed to root for. And how could the final picture of him we have at the moment, where he's so sad and so weighted down, be our final picture of that character? Yeah, the innermost cave, belly of the whale, whatever you want to call it, is part of the hero's journey. But just as Kara goes into those depths and then emerges to find triumph and happiness again, I have to believe they're not going to leave another character they spent so much time investing in that unhappy. We're going to see him again, and they'll give him a happy ending. Or, if they can't work out another appearance for him, because we're talking about real people with a lot of moving parts, we'll get some sort of confirmation he's happy (more on that in a second). They're not going to leave him at loose ends if they can help it.

Now when I talk about them investing in the character - think not just about the storytelling, with this slow burn they had going with Karamel throughout S3, but about the level of promotion during that season, especially the back half. They had Mon-El in the CW midseason sizzle reel, and in a number of promotional posters/photos. They built up to the red-and-blue suit SO MUCH, and why do all of that if it was something you were only going to use for a literal handful of episodes? Some of those pieces of evidence, plus the slow burn/abrupt shift storytelling, plus how open-ended they left things with the relationship, makes me call TOTAL BS on the "it was always a two-season arc thing," and makes me keep believing Karamel is still endgame.

IMHO, Karamel has always been written with that endgame-ish type of storytelling - enemies-to-lovers trope, true love's kiss, spending so much time re-building the relationship between them, etc, etc, etc. You all know what I'm talking about. ((And please note, even though this could be another essay entirely, just because I think they're endgame doesn't mean I think neither character should ever be in another relationship again. I think you LEARN things from every relationship you're in, and Mon-El and Kara were both relatively inexperienced relationship-wise when they got together - Mon-El came from a planet of hedonists where he had flings, not relationships, and Kara had crushes that she couldn't really act on because broken noses, amirite? There were things I genuinely loved about Mon-El and Imra. And I'm not freaked about the possibility of a midgame LI for Kara - it wouldn't lessen my feelings about this being endgame))

Anyway - the story they were telling throughout S3 pointed to Karamel reuniting. They really dialed it up through the final episodes with the robot-cockblocked conversation on Argo (actually everything on Argo - Mon-El with the kid and Kara's heart eyes, the double date, etc, etc, etc), Mon-El pulling out the necklace at opportune moments to remind the viewers he never forgot her, Kara’s multiple conversations with Alura about him (there’s a cut scene from the finale, as well, where Alura tells her that love stories are never simple), Mon-El’s conversation with Winn about not being able to lose her again. They point at it, and then do an abrupt about-face in the finale. I really think that they were heading toward a reunion. We’ll never know exactly what happened behind the scenes, and I know people have different theories, but my gut feeling is that they were discussing behind the scenes whether or not Chris would be back for S4, the writers headed toward their planned ending (a Karamel reunion and a relationship in S4) while hedging their bets with the slow burn, and Chris ultimately made the decision to leave late in the game, and so the writers threw the switch in the finale.

Again, this is entirely me speculating, but I think that Chris made the call to leave not only because he's a multifaceted person who had other behind-the-scenes things he wanted to pursue in the field, but because he walks the walk with his own mental health, and we all know there is a LOT of bullshit that flies around with this show on social media, etc. I'm reading a LOT between the lines here, but the S3 finale aired on June 18, 2018, so I'm assuming they were doing some editing and locking down of the things in May. Chris posted this the first week of May 2019. Excerpts -

"Well look at that: it’s Mental Health Month again! And what interesting timing for me, personally… let’s talk about it. This year has tested me in so many ways." "And while you’re at it, use this occasional toxic and negative platform for something positive and good." "Sending love and kindness to everyone, even the trolliest of trolls out there."

BUT ANYWAY.

Faced with the resources they had and the information they had, the writers still chose to leave things SO OPEN between Karamel. The original draft of the finale - which was shared by @emarasmoak + @snarkymonel ages ago, had a line from Mon-El, “Part of me will always mourn that our paths did not align … But I will always cherish knowing you.” That, to me, suggests a much more FINAL goodbye - and that line was cut, in favor of what we got - where there wasn't really a goodbye, because it might not be one. And the ring and the “In case you ever need me” is definitely a door left WIDE the hell open. The ring is a deus ex machina in case they ever want to use the character again.

My gut feeling - and again, with no inside information - is that Chris didn't want to be a regular anymore, for a number of reasons, but that he didn't leave on bad circumstances, and that he'd be happy to do a guest appearance because he wouldn't be walking into an ONGOING shitstorm (especially if it was something toward the end of the series run).

And regarding the other news we're starting to get about S5: I don't think the fact that Winn and Mon-El left together, and we've heard about Winn coming back but not Mon-El, means he WON'T be back. They could be dribbling out information a bit at a time to keep people interested as a marketing strategy - the Crisis crossover is the most ambitious thing they've EVER done, and you know they'll want to keep ramping up the excitement up all the way from now until December. They could have finished negotiating with Jeremy first while they're still working on Chris for that, or for another event down the line. Supergirl has a lot of "big event" potential coming up, between the crossover, the milestone 100th episode, Melissa's debut as a director, and they've got to be thinking ahead down the line to the eventual end of the series. All of those are things they'll want to really build up excitement for and maybe have some familiar faces around for.

I DO believe that Winn's appearance will tell us something about if, or how, they intend to use Mon-El again at any point, however. Look, the two of them are close. I wasn't that cranky when Brainy didn't mention Mon-El much last season - I got the impression they were more coworkers than friends, things were tense between them for a solid chunk of time over Brainy's role in Imra's secret plan, and then there was some SERIOUS snark thrown between them in the S3 finale in a cut scene (as for Brainy's one mention of Mon-El and his comment about "microagressions," we all dissected that here). I will be cranky if Winn, who has always been a close friend to Mon-El and is coming directly back to the story from working with Mon-El, doesn't mention him. But again, I think that mention will tell us a lot about the future of the character. He could tell the Superfriends (and thus, the audience) that Mon-El has reconciled with Imra, or has moved on to someone else (side note - in the comic canon, Mon-El's pet name for ShadowLass is "Shady" and I think that's adorable). He could even have some sort of tragic news about him, which seems less probable to me, because why go through the trouble of bringing him back from the dead in the S3 finale and then leaving things so open-ended if you were going to kill him offscreen? On the other hand, if Winn tells Kara Mon-El says hey, or he misses you (she misses him too!) or if they have some sort of heartfelt conversation about him, then that's obviously a positive sign.

I mean, who am I kidding, I have epic trust issues from their bait-and-switch with this story and I don’t trust any of the writers/showrunners as far as I can throw them and I am about three inches from FLIPPING OUT over this entire situation :P But I don’t feel so bad after some deep analysis.

[beautymercurydragon]

Kara Lahiffe

YAY I WAS HOPING SOMEONE WOULD ASK ME ABOUT HER!! She’ll be really fun to write with, and she’s one of the most featured of the main seven.

Full name: Kara Christine Lahiffe (Christine is actually a French-used name, and since I hc Alya as being a Supergirl fan, I had to name her firstborn child/daughter that. Tho it’s pronounced as the ‘Cara’ part in Nino’s Carapace hero name, so it’s a blended nod to both.)

Gender: Cis female

Sexuality: Straight

Pronouns: She/Her

Ethnicity/species: Human, Moroccan, Martinique and French (50% French, 25% Moroccan and 25% Martinique, if my math is correct)

Birthplace: Paris, France (she was born in England, actually. Alya and Nino took the Startrain there for an event Alya was interviewing at and the night before, she went into labor a week-ish early. Kara was supposed to be born on the 25th of August lol. So technically, she’s always lived in France, but was born in England [tho Alya and Nino left there as soon as they got out of the hospital]. Either way, she still considers herself born in France.)

Birthday: August 19th, 2029 (she’s 15)

Guilty pleasures: Hmm… oranges? She only really likes extra-sweet fruit, so for her to like oranges is rare. Also lemonade, considering the regular-flavored is usually more sour than sweet. But she does prefer strawberry lemonade.

Phobias: Snakes. Which is funny, considering she was trained by Luka (who was the Snake holder, Viperion) as a musician and theater singer. Also lying, boredom, no fun etc., considering she’s more vibrant and energetic than one would usually expect of someone of her age group.

What they would be famous for: Definitely acting and theater/singing. She actually wins a contest for her school at one point and gets her own imagined story as a child turned into a TV show, called Codename: Scarlet Fox, and it’ll have a lot of importance to the story. As for doing theater, she’d likely be a West End star at some point in her life as a young adult (basically London’s version of Broadway, from my understanding. I live in the US lol), considering she could easily take the Startrain to England.

What they would be arrested for: Doing something to Brooke lol. She’s one of the ones who’s more fed up with her and treated worse, right up with Vivienne, considering Brooke’s racist and doesn’t consider dark-skinned French people real French citizens.

OC you ship them with: Her love interest Gino, who gets the Monkey Miraculous at some point. And even tho she’s straight, I think a relationship between her and Rebecca (who’s bi) would be interesting. They have the competitiveness in common, both dream of being on Broadway/sing and act, and are both great at baking. (Rebecca ends up with Emma though) If I didn’t have so many ideas in mind that would be a factor of developing their friendship and Kara wasn’t straight with a love interest, I would likely have put them together as a couple.

OC most likely to murder them: Despite how much Brooke hates Kara, I feel she wouldn’t try to harm her. Mainly because Kara knows how to fight (blame Nora lol), and she’s quick and witty and always has a response to her as well. Plus, she’s a superhero and has flexibility, so she could kick her in the face or elsewhere lmao.

So, I don’t really feel like anyone would. Not to mention, she could easily fool them with her Mirage and make a run for it as Scarlett Fox, considering nobody really hates her that much as a civilian to want her dead.

Favorite movie/book genre: Humor, adventure and action

Least favorite movie/book cliche: ‘Misunderstood’ high school clique. Lol she HATES that with a burning passion

Talents and/or powers: She’s good at bare-knuckle boxing, and is a harpist, flutist, theater/stage/TV-trained actress and theater singer.

As for her alter-ego, she gets the Fox Miraculous, and she has a more powered-up version of the Mirage considering Vivienne uses the Butterfly to permanently upgrade their powers at one point. Her upgraded version allows her illusions to actually become 3-D and realistic, so she can make her Mirage create fake versions of the other heroes to distract villains.

She’s also another one of the multilingual next-gen kids (well they all are really lmao), so she’s a speaker of French, English, Arabic (considering Nino is confirmed Moroccan and that’s Morocco’s official language they speak) (she’s faring nicely but is still a little rough in some points), and begins to take Japanese lessons from Kagami. Tho she’s awful at it at first, and it is her worst class at the start, but over time she improves vastly.

Why someone might love them: She cares for others, knows how to put a smile on one’s face when they’re sad, and is in general a fun and great person. She’s also rather loyal and knows how to help others, and is always up for a challenge.

Why someone might hate them: Hmm…. she’s really likable in general, but I feel her doing-before-thinking behavior she can have sometimes really can get the best of her. She’s also a bit loud, but not always.

Once she becomes famous because of her TV show, she also becomes really prideful about it and will sometimes use it to boast about herself, but she really doesn’t mean it and is just excited about her lifelong dream coming true, in reality, which is something only those who are close to her know is true.

How they change: She learns how to get a hold of herself when hard, be serious always, and how to work with others and expand her priority (and soon enough, gets a role in a movie and a West End summer camp for teens).

Why you love them: I honestly adore her sense of humor, wittiness, and how she’s always there for those she loves and is so chill about everything.

Another thing is that she’s actually really smart, despite her ‘party girl’ image and the promiscuous stereotype she gained over the years (because the media in next-gen AU is crappy except for Alya and Nadja lmao, with a few other exceptions), ever since she was thirteen. The media really hated her and applied that stereotype to her, considering her image as a ‘bad kid’ made them believe she’d be a bad role model for Maddie, who’s been a media darling since forever. She’s also rather good at memorizing things quickly and is able to think fast/on her feet, and while I consider myself highly intelligent, I really am not the best at thinking fast sometimes haha.

Thanks for the ask @jazzymarie1006! Sorry for taking a while to respond lol.

[fyeahdpanabaker]

When a panel revolves around a single cast member of any given show at Fan Fest Chicago, it can be intimate and informative. But when a majority of the cast gets involved, hilarity pursues.

This was most definitely the case when Danielle Panabaker, Hartley Sawyer, Tom Cavanagh, and Danielle Nicolet took the stage for the Team Flash panel.

Each actor showed the amount of friendship they shared with one another by telling inside jokes, one-liners, and flat-out zingers — all in good fun. Overall their love for The Flash and their fellow actors shone through like a twinkling star.

As they all entered the stage, they welcomed each other warmly, pointing out each other’s strengths on the show and in life. They all seemed to be very fond of Danielle Panabaker’s directing style, which she debuted on The Flash Season 5 Episode 18.

Tom Cavanagh started with a joke saying, “She certainly set a high bar for hygiene.”

After a few chuckles, he focused on the difficulties of directing the show, “On a serious note, this show is a very difficult show to direct because of the fact that the Earth rotates once every 24 hours. There is just no time to get in all the things you need to do.”

“Danielle was wise enough to be one of our most prepared directors. The two-week preparation is massively important,” he continued. He then turned to her and said, “You thought out all your options and were remarkably prepared.”

Throwing a kind word back to Cavanagh, Danielle Panabaker said, “Tom taught me everything I know.”

Panabaker went on to explain, “I shadowed Tom in Season 4 when he directed Season 4 Episode 4, which was the introduction of Hartley Sawyer’s character.”

Hartley Sawyer chimed in, “I remember that. That was my first episode. You [Panabaker] were running out to a meeting and shadowing Tom and all that. It was really cool to start there and still be here for you to direct Episode 18 — you were so composed and seamless.”

Another audience member stood up and wondered if any of the actors had any other plans if acting didn’t work out for them, or if they never got discovered.

Danielle Nicolet was the first to answer. “I had no plan B. My whole plan was leap empty-handed into the void and hope that something good happens — I got lucky.”

Cavanagh corrected her, “We got very, very lucky.”

Nicolet smiled, then added, “On behalf of all actors, I would like to say there is no such thing as being discovered. It is a tough job, and you have to put 100 percent into it. You have to train, and you have to go to hundreds of auditions before you find the perfect job.”

Panabaker agreed, “You worked really hard and then you got an opportunity.”

An Arrow fan in the crowd wanted to know how the ending of that series would impact The Flash and the yearly crossovers. Confused looks and banter erupted between the cast members as Cavanagh admitted he didn’t even know that Arrow was ending with Season 8.

Panabaker then addressed the audience saying, “As you can tell, none of us have any idea. Before anyone else asks, they just started writing Season 6 of The Flash, and Season 8 of Arrow. So nobody knows anything.”

Sawyer made it known that he wasn’t overly concerned about it. “We have Supergirl and Legends. We have Batwoman coming in, right?”

Cavanagh then joked, “We can always crossover with Game of Thrones. Who would like to see a Flash/Game of Thrones project?”

Panabaker ended the subject by saying, “We are not even done with Season 5 yet — there is great stuff still coming!”

A younger member of the crowd wanted to know if anyone onstage had any hidden talents, and the collective answer was no.

Sawyer had no qualms about telling it like it is. “This question comes up a lot — I’m just not a talented person at all.”

This rolled into further questioning about what they put down as talents on their resumes. It turns out, the stars are about as truthful as we are when applying for a job.

Panabaker said, “I rode a horse once; therefore, I am an excellent horseback rider.” Nicolet also joked, “I’m a tap dancer,” then added, “Hell no.”

Sawyer thought for a moment, then added, “I had bullwhip cracking on there. I haven’t done that in like 10 years, because who does that ever?

He then yelled out to the audience, “Where’s the bullwhip, get it out here!”

Surprisingly enough, someone was actually able to find Sawyer the whip he was looking for. After a few mock attempts and false starts, Sawyer and the rest of the cast onstage decided it was for the best to skip it.

Panabaker summed it all up, “To get back to the earlier point — actors lie.”

After the laughter subsided, Panabaker tackled questions about becoming Killer Frost. “The process every day is about 90 minutes,” she said.

Panabaker explained, “They tie my hair up, and then they do the makeup. Then it’s a wig and contacts — then I get dressed.”

This evolved into a discussion on whether Killer Frost will remain a hero, or slide back into enemy territory. Cavanagh said, “It is great that she is friendly but at some point…”

Panabaker agreed, “Yeah, she has that dark side.”

The sole audience member still in line asked in a meek voice, “If you could describe your cast members in one word, what would it be?”

Panabaker said with a smile, “Love because I love them all in different ways.”

Everyone seemed to like that word, but Sawyer wanted to make it more precise. “Family comes to mind because we all have a family thing going on here.”

Panabaker and the rest of the cast members had to agree — family was the best fit.

And it was true. Seeing this foursome onstage interacting with each other, giving playful banter, and compliments to one another, really screamed family, a complete love for one another that spoke volumes from the stage.

As they all left the stage, it was nearly impossible to not be a bigger fan of The Flash than you already were when you walked in the door that day.

[foxydivaxx]

Bad Blood Chapter 1

Originally, this was meant to be connected to Young Justice: Demigods Arising but I have decided to tweak it a bit and make it the true Demigods Arising story of sorts. This is connected to the Osiris fic and whilst it is kinda Cassie-centric, it also focuses on other characters too. 

"Any news about Cassie?"

"Nah. No one has found her yet."

Tim sighs. It has been a month since Cassie disappeared after her humiliating defeat to Vanessa for the Wonder Girl title. Part of her regrets that decision to have said duel take place. She made that decision not considering what Cassie was going through then. The poor girl lost her then boyfriend Conner Kent and later got dumped by him. Sure, Conner returned but their relationship soon turned toxic to the point where the two engaged in a physical altercation in the School Hall that caused Cassie to get suspended for two weeks. As a result of this, Diana decided to punish her not taking into consideration Cassie’s physical and mental exhaustion at that point. According to Tatiana, Cassie overtrained herself and that led to Cassie’s humiliating defeat.

And now it is too late, Cassie has gone and would never return and if she ever returns, the girl would have joined the Dark Side which should not surprise anyone given her heritage and the negative influence of people like Ares. As if that wasn't bad enough, Cassie's younger twin sister Tatiana also followed suit. 

Adding more to the Cassie mystery is that she immediately deleted all her social media accounts on the same day as her defeat. That alone alarmed everyone as it is a well-known fact that Cassie loved taking selfies and playing around on social media and often talks to fans on there. But now that her presence is no longer felt, many began to panic, feeling that the poor girl might have committed suicide. This naturally led to the #JusticeForCassie campaign and #WonderWomanCancelled movement.

Please let Cassie not be dead.

Meanwhile in her room, Barbara was going through some files that she managed to dig up about HIVE case. So far she had managed to find some leads. Heck she can even say that she is far more competent and smarter than the entire Team as they are all a bunch of little kids. What was Batman thinking of putting little kids on a superhero team? Ok they are young kids, but they still could qualify for a wannabe superhero team since they all wear stupid outlandish costumes and use silly codenames, themselves and the so-called adults that call themselves Justice League. Seriously, what the fuck is that fucked up shit? Worst of the bunch as far as she is concerned is none other than Wonder Woman's little sidekick Cassie Sandsmark better known as Wonder Girl.

That girl is such a tragic trainwreck and a bitch. What did Tim and Conner ever see in her? What really pisses her off about the brat is that the girl reminds her of the stupid alien that Dick dated years ago. What was her name again? Oh yes Starfire. More like Hofire. Both of them are disgustingly beautiful. Starfire is a bit better because at least she can kick some ass. Cassie is completely useless that one forgets that she is supposed to be a fucking demigoddess yet someone like Damian can whoop her ass. She should even be able to go toe to toe with Supergirl and give her a nasty beatdown but nope, she gets her ass handed to her. Plus she dared to steal her Dickie from her.

Where did Diana find this child again? Oh yes, Diana did not find her instead the child fucking inserted herself into the Wonder Woman narrative just like Damian forced his way into the Robin title and never once earned nor deserved a single shit till recently. When will those brats learn? No wonder some people wished for Vanessa to take over as Wonder Girl. Ironically said girl is now Wonder Girl now how hilarious.

And alas, poor Cassie has disappeared and is nowhere to be seen. Well GOOD FUCKING RIDDANCE! Barbara cackles evilly as she still plays around on her system.

Meanwhile at Gateway city, Tatiana was in her room with tears in her eyes whilst Donna comforts her. Cassie disappeared immediately after that defeat. One could understand why because that sort of defeat is very humiliating especially when the very girl that caused most of the unneeded drama in your life is responsible for it.

Making matters worse is the fact that many thought that Cassie was an irresponsible person and therefore unworthy to be Wonder Girl. This has been an ongoing debate for the past couple years. Sure Cassie has a temper but she can actually control said temper for the most part. The only reason that said rage has become more pronounced is as a result of Ares’ evil manipulation of his sister; something Diana and Zeus himself warned Cassie about. 

Cassie naturally took the bait since she had lost her powers during that time, not like anyone could blame her. Still the fact that many people bashed her for this, Diana included was horrible. Now after years of hypocrisy on the side of the heroes, no one should be surprised if Cassie suddenly and openly denounces them and exposes all their secrets or even goes all Superboy Prime on them or worse commit suicide.

Donna sighed. Sure Cassie has some shortcomings but Diana herself is a hypocrite, in fact everyone has been hypocritical when it comes to Cassie. A lot of the criticism being leveled upon the girl might as well be applied to other heroes as well like Conner or Tim for instance.

Ironically said hypocrisy has been thrown at Amon aka Osiris several times which is why said boy has distanced himself from the superhero community recently. Black Adam openly lambasted the League and everyone else for that and rightfully so. 

I hope you find happiness and peace Cassie. 

Just then Donna’s phone rings. She checks the phone and discovers that it is Kori calling her. She then answers the call. “Hi Kori.”

“Donna....you have to come down here quick!!”

A couple miles in New York, Cassie is standing on top of a rooftop, preparing to throw herself down and commit suicide. Now one would find it laughable since she is meant to be a demigoddess, until they realize one disturbing detailing: Cassie lost her powers yet again during the duel and has remained powerless ever since.

The rest of the Team bursts through the door. “CASSIE DON’T!!” Conner shouts. Cassie turns around with tears in her eyes. The others begin to feel guilty for making her feel that way.

“There is nothing left for me here. You have all made it clear that I do not belong here. So why waste my time when I can just elsewhere and find peace. Heck even Hell is more peaceful than here. I cannot stay with the gods because of they are going through their own drama and are killing each other anyway.” 

She takes a couple steps back. “Cassie I understand why you are mad at us and you have every right to hate us. But I want you to know that there are people that still love you regardless.” Kori says in the most gentle way possible.

It was at that moment that Cassie literally explodes. “LIES!! PURE UTTER LIES!! IF YOU ALL REALLY CARED, YOU WOULD HAVE ALLOWED ME TO PROPERLY EXPLAINED MYSELF!! YOU WOULD NOT HAVE ENCOURAGED TIM OR ANYONE TO BE ABUSIVE TO ME!!! YOU WOULD HAVE STOPPED BABS WHEN YOU SPREAD HER FILTHY GOSSIP ABOUT ME AND ALL OF YOU JOINED IN TO SLUTSHAME ME FOR YOUR PLEASURE!! YOU ARE AS BAD AS THE MEDIA!! PURE UTTER HYPOCRITES WHO ONLY CARE ABOUT HOOTING THEIR HORNS!! NOW I CAN SEE WHY PEOPLE LIKE JASON TURNED THEIR BACKS ON HUMANITY AND CHOSE TO DO HARDCORE JUSTICE!! YOU MOTHERFUCKERS ARE NOT SO DIFFERENT FROM THE VERY FOOLS WE HAVE BEEN FIGHTING FROM YEARS!!”

Everyone keeps quiet. Cassie clearly had been waiting for this moment and she has now gotten an audience. “Oh and speaking of failures, how many times have we been supposedly, not I used supposedly in quotation marks here because that shows how stupid you all are, were ahead of the bad guys only for them to outsmart us and somehow win?”

Dick and Kaldur exchange looks. “You know, had it not been for my father, I would have rotted in jail. Oh and special shoutout to the Black Adam family, the only family that ever truly cared about me. Plus of course Donna and Tatiana. The rest of you can go fuck yourselves and leave me be!!” She turns her back to them and ignores them as she walks over to the edge.

“Cassie wait...”

She stops and turns around as Vanessa walks in. “Cassie, listen I know you are mad. If you want to lash out. Take it out on me.” she says calmly, hands raised. Before anyone could say anything, Cassie stomps towards her so-called rival and aims a punch at Vanessa who does nothing to stop her.

Fortunately for her, Cassie stops mid-punch and drops to her knees and begins to break down in tears. Vanessa bends down and hugs her predecessor. “Listen Cass. No matter what anyone else says, you will always be Wonder Girl. In fact you are way better than I am. I do not like the great divide that Diana has created. There are other ways this could have been done.” she says. Cassie simply sobs, feeling very bad for lashing out.

“I...I’m so sorry...”

Vanessa smiles softly. “You do not have to apologise. We are both victims in this. Besides, I told Diana that I quit.” Cassie stares at her in disbelief. ”You did not have to.”

“Yet I did.”

Cassie shakes her head. “No. You remain Wonder Girl.” Cassie then smiles. “Besides, you earned it anyways.” Vanessa giggles and hugs her back. Everyone heaves a sigh of relief.

Osiris who had just arrived makes a slow descent next to them. “Cass, I understand you hate everyone and whatnot but if you throw yourself down there, chances are you might end up worse than Todd the moment they choose to bring you back from the dead. Or if you choose down a dark path now, you might end up the way Adam did years ago.”

The girl simply nods. “ I might as well go clear my mind of things for a while.”

He comes closer to her. “You know, you could have simply asked and I would gladly take you home with me so that you can get some breathing space since quite frankly, you need some of that.’ She rolls her eyes. “Fine. Let’s go.’ She wraps her arms around his neck with him wrapping his arms aorund her securely and together they fly away.

“Wait....that was it?“ says Garfield, earning a smack across the head from Raven. “Oww!!” he grumbles. Tim meanwhile stares up at the sky with jealousy in his eyes which is funny considering his relationship with Stephanie. 

So she has choosen him hm? This whole shit was a setup to make that announcement.

[douxreviews]

Supergirl - ‘O Brother, Where Art Thou?’ Review

Lena Luthor: How can you pay your debt to society if you’re already dead?

An enjoyable episode, back to the basics of the comics – but not much depth for Kara.

The episode follows several storylines. Lex Luthor has been let out of prison (but with lots of guards) because he’s dying of cancer. He visits his sister Lena to seek a cure for his cancer, especially as he knows she’s been working on a drug based on the magic stone from Krypton that just might do the trick. It’s interesting to watch the half-siblings interact. Lex doesn’t seem like all that bad a guy and he doesn’t seem that dangerous. He eggs Lena on, but also tells her some truths.

The B story is concerned with James, who was shot at the end of the prior episode. He gets rescued immediately, by using the watch that I remember given to him in one of the Superman comics which I read many decades ago. The watch has to be activated to send out a distress signal, so I spent the whole episode wondering who activated it. James couldn’t and a killer wouldn’t, so what was going on? Turns out the shooter wasn’t trying to kill James, but it wasn’t a loose plot thread either. Anyway, the friends of James (including ex-girlfriend Lena) gather in the hospital, and are joined by Kelly, James’s sister. James is alive, but in bad shape, and the question is – operate on him (probably paralyze him but save his life) or give him Lena’s drug (perfect health but possibly kills him)? Kelly, as next-of-kin, has to make the decision. She doesn’t trust the Luthors. She opts for surgery, quite reasonably pointing out that Lex Luthor has been trying to kill her brother over and over. Then the power at the hospital fails while James is in surgery and Lena rushes in with the improved-but-untested drug, which is now James's only option. And saves her ex-boyfriend. Whew!

The C story – not very interesting – are J’onn and Supergirl following Manchester Black – who they assume (incorrectly) shot J’onn. Manchester Black is managing to infiltrate J’onn’s thoughts and visions, and provokes J’onn into attacking him and apparently killing him. I say “apparently” because, you know, how often do characters really die in these series? Anyway, the ring that Black stole from Brainy falls to the ground and it gets returned to Brainy, while J’onn realizes/decides that he’s not a man of peace after all. Honestly, I didn’t really care, although the action scene does give Supergirl the chance to say: “Dam it,” on TV. We seem to have finished with Agent Liberty in the last episode; does this mean that we’re done with Manchester Black as well? I wouldn’t mind.

I was actually a little relieved not to be having to follow too many storylines. The end, where we learn that Lex took advantage of the threat on the dam to engineer a power outage that compelled Lena to test her drug on James before he tried it on himself, was just convoluted enough to be pleasantly surprising without being confusing (and his henchman, the one who shot James Olsen to turn him into a test bunny, was the guy who summoned Supergirl with his watch). But the sweetest reveal was when Eve Tessmacher pulled a gun on Lena Luthor. “How long have you been working for him?” Lena asks, and Eve replies, “Always.” Of course, she was his sidekick/love interest before, so that was perfectly reasonable.

The episode ends with Lex Luthor – after murdering a whole bunch of people – flying away in a helicopter and seeing Supergirl hovering outside.

Title musings: “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” is also name of a movie that I have not seen, which was apparently based on Homer’s The Odyssey, which I have read. I can’t see any similarities between the episode and The Odyssey. We can take a literal interpretation as the helicopter flies off with Lex and so Lena doesn’t know where her brother is. It also applies to Kelly, who probably often wonders where James is.

Bits and pieces

Lex Luthor quotes Epicurus and says the Greek philosopher lived 230 years ago. But it’s more like 2300 years ago. Big mistake.

Fun to see Jon Cryer as a very sick Lex Luthor, a role so different from his role as sidekick and a whiny, younger brother in Two and a Half Men.

Now we know why Katie McGrath had so little to do as Lena in the last episode. Because of all her work in this episode.

The make-up folks did a great job of making Kara and Alex look absolutely horrible for J’onn’s hallucination.

Nice to have Nia kiss Brainy. However, there was not enough Brainy in the episode. They weren’t offering much support, just hanging around the vending machine.

Quotes

Lex Luthor: I am the man of tomorrow. Not him! Not him!

Lex Luthor: If the Latin fits.

Lex Luthor: I want you to know with certainty, that while I came from poison, you came from love. And if the rest of this family stands steadily in darkness, you will always fall into the light.

Kelly: Jell-O really is the best hospital food.

Brainy (after pounding with futility on vending machine): I usually get along so well with machines.

Kara/Supergirl: Dam it. (Closest she gets to being able to say damn it, but there was a literal dam breaking. Noticed they had no closed captioning, at least on my screen, at that moment.)

Overall Rating

The episode was enjoyable and Lex Luthor was great. The problem, however, is that they’re not giving Supergirl anything emotional to do; she hardly ever has any quotable quotes. Even her tension with Alex’s not knowing her secret identity was lame. Two and a half out of four bowls of Jell-O.

Victoria Grossack loves math, Greek mythology, Jane Austen and great storytelling in many forms.

[cyclone-rachel]

A Life That I Can’t Leave Behind

a Supergirl fanfic

read on AO3 here

It’s been half a year.

Winn left, for the future, almost six months ago- well, to be more precise (and he knows he’s supposed to be) he’s been gone six months and thirteen days.

And even though it’s been so long, he still doesn’t quite know how he fits into his whole situation. He knows where he’s supposed to be, of course, and is doing his best… but the only person who could tell him how to properly do his job can’t help him- until Winn has completed his actual job, and doesn’t need that advice at all.

He’s frustrated, to say the least.

And that isn’t even to mention the Brainiac situation, and how Winn feels so very small when he so much as studies the blueprints for his ship, or gets a glimpse of it as it hovers just over the atmosphere of Colu, or Grenda, or any of the other planets with artificial life that he’s become so familiar with recently.

(It reminds him of facing off against his father, really- feeling helpless yet again, and knowing one’s enemy so well, and even understanding them, yet knowing there’s only a thin line that separates the two of them, and that only one of them will cross it.

Winn makes it his mission to stay on his side of the line, and do what he can. But he’s still afraid that, one day, he’ll wake up, and find Brainiac’s ship hovering over Earth, about to swallow himself and everyone he’s made connections with so far)

But as much as he does, he can’t be Brainy. He can’t replace him for Mon-El or Imra, or any of the other Legionnaires he’s met. (He still can’t keep their names straight, sometimes, as much as he wants to.) He’s not the friend that they left behind in the past, and he knows he won’t ever be.

And as much faith in him as Brainy has… there are still days where he doubts him. Even though, as Brainy would probably tell him if he were here, it would be far more logical not to do so.

Winn sits in Brainy’s chair (that at the very least he’s learned to control, since he left) and pulls out his design, enclosed in glass. The design that Brainy apparently stole from some archive, that’s supposed to be important in future technology.

Groundbreaking, was the word he used.

He neglected to warn Winn that it was also the foundation for some of Brainiac’s shielding technology, that said villain takes cold delight in using against him. Fortunately, the Legion has the original version of it, instead of a reverse-engineered copy, which makes their shields objectively superior.

(And Winn’s even been able to outfit them with personal shields, thanks to a model that Brainy invented himself- which has saved them several times on stealth missions so far.)

So, there’s that, at least. And there haven’t been any major deaths so far. But Winn gets the feeling that Brainiac is only biding his time, waiting for the Legionnaires to make a move against him.

“In other words, I’m trapped on one side of the world’s deadliest chess game.” He mutters to himself. “Even worse than that one from the first Harry Potter.”

But Winn keeps looking at the design, despite initial instinct to smash the glass against the floor and crumple the paper up so it’s reduced to dust. It is, after all, why Brainy wanted him in the future, and why Brainy so suddenly changed his tune, from tearing him down to literally giving him the promotion to end all promotions. It was his greatest shame, yes, but that was all in the past.

Nobody remembers its first victim.

Nobody knows about the shame Winn felt, when the design was first given to him, and the burning resolve that replaced it.

He wants to make things better, and he’s dedicating himself to doing just that, so nobody gets hurt again if he can prevent it. And even though nobody’s aware of Demos, or the effect he had on the technology they rely on, Winn still remembers.

He doubts he’ll ever forget, which seems like both a blessing and a curse at the moment.

“Winn?” Imra calls, walking into the room, as he circles the chair around to face her. “Hey. I know you’ve been busy lately, but… I think it’s time you get the night off.”

Brainiac doesn’t take nights off, Winn thinks.

“I know, I know, criminals don’t take breaks.” She says. “Well, they might- but that isn’t my business. But anyway, on Earth, it’s tradition to celebrate the new year, isn’t it?”

“Yeah…” Winn answers. “And that’s today?”

“Yes.” She says. “So, we’re having a party, and I can at least speak for some of us when I say that we’d really like to see you there.”

“Right, I forgot.” Winn answers, pushing himself out of the chair, wobbling a little bit as he regains his footing on the floor. He shakes his head, slipping his design back into his pocket. “I’ll be right there.”

Imra smiles.

“Good, I’ll let the others know.” She says. Then she’s gone again, and Winn’s left watching her.

He can’t be Brainy, he knows that enough. And as much responsibility as he’s been given, he knows not even Brainy expects him to completely fill his shoes. But he wants to make him proud- and seeing as how Brainy’s counting on him, he knows he needs to try.

He really is going to try, no matter how long it takes him to do so, either in his new time or his old.

Six months and thirteen days, out here, feels like an eternity to Winn- far be it from him to try to imagine how much time is passing in the twenty-first century.

At least, he hopes it’s long enough that they miss him too.

And maybe they’re also celebrating New Year’s- no matter how many years might’ve passed for them.

~

Brainy’s on the rooftop garden again, sitting on top of the damp table as rain drips from the sky.

It’s dark, and not as cold as he thinks it might have been. But even if it were cold, he wouldn’t have minded it, as he was used to this kind of climate.

(Or, as Kara had put it once in a sing-song voice, “The cold never bothered you anyway!” He didn’t understand this reference, and as he pointed out back then, the same could apply to her. She’d lightly hit him on the arm, and rolled her eyes, before going back inside. He’d followed, still confused, even though he had told the truth)

Truth be told, he could’ve chosen any place to brood, but he does like feeling tall, so the height of his current position doesn’t bother him. All he wanted was someplace quiet, free of distractions- even the most pleasant ones that he concerns himself with on a day-to-day basis. He’s always sought such places out, whenever he’s moved to new locations- though he isn’t sure whether he’s gotten used to being alone by now, by his own choice, or whether nobody else chooses to be in the same room as he, and they just refuse to visit him on principle.

(He doesn’t let himself dwell on that, for obvious reasons)

Winn would let others in, he knows. And others would visit him, certainly.

It’s been six months and thirteen days, and as much as he’s become accustomed to the DEO (as much it’s changed, over the past four especially) he still knows he isn’t going to fill Winn’s role there for Alex and Kara, or even those he associates with less, that he’s aware Winn would’ve spent far more time with, had he been there.

But of course, if he was there, the future wouldn’t be safe- and Brainy would never dream of depriving the future of him until he knows its safety is secure.

He has no way of knowing how long that will be, though, of course, so until Winn does return, he’s forced to wait.

(There’s a phrase he’s learned since he’s been in this century: “No news is good news”. He understands it to mean that, if one doesn’t hear from someone else, everything is perfectly fine. And, to some extent, he can understand that- applying it to his specific situation, if Winn was in trouble, he would’ve contacted Kara or Alex by now. But then again, also, it only makes him worry- what if Winn can’t contact him? What if Winn is in danger, captured and bottled by the enemy he was supposed to stop?

Or, perhaps, things are going on schedule for him, and he can’t afford distractions- or, something that should give Brainy reassurance but also might irritate him if he devotes too much thought to it, Winn might not need his help at all. That would be good news, except for the fact that Brainy won’t know until he does come back.)

(If he does.)

He doesn’t appreciate not knowing, in general, though like with many other things in this century, he’s become used to it.

Just like he’s become used to, among other things, Kara finding him- and though he did need some alone time, he has the feeling that he’s going to be convinced to return to her apartment for some reason or another.

Which, at this point, he’s ready for. Better than countless simulations detailing ways Winn could die, or rarely, be triumphing against Brainiac at this moment. With this, he can keep his mind in the present day, and on someone he can actually help in person, which he considers right this time to be a relief.

“Hey, Brainy!” she says from behind him, and Brainy doesn’t think about the specifics of how she found him. “Did you want to come back inside?”

When he doesn’t answer for a moment, she continues with, “You don’t have to. You can keep getting rained on, if you really want- but don’t blame me if you get a cold, or rust, or whatever this kind of weather does to you.”

“I will not rust.” He says. “But thank you for the concern.”

“You’re welcome.” Kara answers. “For the record, though, you’re missing an awesome New Year’s Eve party.”

Brainy smiles, then, turning to her. “We celebrate the same thing, in my century.”

She leaps onto the table he’s sitting on, then, and sits beside him.

“Huh. Guess some things never change.” She says, looking up at the clouds. “And that means you have something to celebrate, in your time, don’t you?”

“Yes.” He says. “I suppose… even though I have no way of knowing what’s going on in the future.”

“Yeah, but you still believe in your friends, right?” Kara asks.

Brainy gives her a small nod.

“Then you have nothing to worry about.” She says. “For the future, at least. But in this time…”

“In this time, what?”

“Well, for starters, Alex is gonna get to all the alcohol before the rest of us even get a chance to toast to the new year.” She answers. “And if I’m not mistaken, I believe I saw a certain type of pizza on the order with your name on it. And I happen to know that it isn’t as good cold, so you might as well eat it while you can.”

“That is true.” He answers. “But I do have someone who can just as easily heat up any kind of pizza for me, if she so desires.”

“I could…” Kara says. “You should come inside first, though.”

There’s nothing that will change, if I stay out here. He thinks. Whatever might be happening with Winn, it isn’t like he’s going to return at this moment- in fact, he may even be celebrating the new year on his own. I may as well go in, and take advantage of this time I have here.

After all, who knows if I will return?

He jumps off the table, feeling the slight shock from it, and Kara joins him, reaching for his hand.

Brainy allows her to take it, and together they return to Kara’s apartment.

Back to warmth, and family, and safety and togetherness and certainty- everything Brainy values at this moment, in this century, during the dawn of the new year.

That, at least, he can hold on to, while waiting for news from the future, no matter what said news turns out to be.

[pulaasul]

Impostor 4

Check-ups, reveals, and bombshells in this chapter.

FFN I Ao3

--------

Back at CARAT's base, the Kiramagers have powered down, and are wearing their respective CARAT uniforms, Juru included.

Whereas the present ToQgers were simply wearing what they had worn when they arrived at the city.

"I take it that the president stating you were sparkling was a lie?" Hikari asked his cousin.

"No, Juru has always been sparkling!" A disembodied voice disagreed. "His Kiramentality is on par with that of the king's!"

A panel from the wall opened and revealed several crystals with different colors.

"Right's going to be so jealous!" Kagura exclaimed. "We met aliens before him!"

"Technically we met an extra-terrestrial sentai team before," Hikari pointed out. "Although the one we met was from Earth."

"So it still counts!" Kagura squealed.

"I suppose it does." Hikari offered a smile.

Kagura shook Mabushina's and Takamichi's hands all the while looking around.

"But back to the topic, Kiramentality?" Hikari asked.

"The best way to explain it is having a big talent and passion for that talent, I guess," Sena offered. "For example, I am a track athlete, which means my passion and talent are geared towards running faster," She explained. "As a Kiramager I can be the fastest one on the battlefield."

"Shiguru's an actor, who usually plays characters that use swords." Tametomo supplied. "As a Kiramager, he can use the sword-fighting techniques he learned as an actor and apply them as a Kiramager."

"In fact, you both have a huge amount of Kiramentality." The yellow stone rocked himself.

"Ju-nii's talent and passion are in the art department, which would mean he can manifest whatever he draws in his sketchbook?" Hikari offered his hypothesis. "Can't believe someone beat you, Kagura, in the imagination department." He chuckled.

"What do you mean?" Tametomo couldn't help but ask.

"Our powers are largely based on imagination." Kagura stated.

"And yes Ju-nii wouldn't be out of place if he was a ToQger." Hikari immediately added.

"That's why all of us, at least the core five are children." Kagura continued.

"It makes sense as children have the most imagination." Hakataminami nodded bitterly.

"Kagura has the strongest imagination among all of us, if she can imagine herself being able to fly like the character, Supergirl, she'll give herself super strength and flight," Hikari informed. "She almost drowned once because she imagined herself to be underwater when we were just playing on dry land."

"Hikari-kun and the others had to stop one of my attacks because I imagined myself dragging the enemy to hell." Kagura admitted, embarrassed.

"That's a terrifying thought," Shiguru voiced Tametomo's thoughts, who gulped at his cousin's powerful imagination.

"As for you Ju-nii, you know grandma really hates liars."

"It was actually me who discovered Juru-san and found him sparkling," Mabushina spoke up.

"I guess, you weren't really lying," Hikari smirked at his cousin. "Technically."

"Right back at you, you would only have been nine or ten when you first transformed," Juru pouted. "I don't think they'd approve of you being a Sentai."

"They won't," Hikari nodded. "There's a reason how they don't know to this day."

"Is it really okay to tell them, Hikari-kun?" Kagura asked.

"Tell us what, Kagura-chan?" Tametomo gulped, fearing the answer.

"There's a reason why everyone forgot about the people of Subarugahama for one year." Hikari dropped one huge bombshell.

--------

Everyone was at a loss at the bombshell both Hikari and Kagura dropped. They had told the Kiramagers, especially Juru and Tametomo, the whole reason for everyone forgetting the town of Subarugahama and its inhabitants.

"And you were only nine when that all started." Sena gasped.

"Kagura-chan, can you come with me for a bit?" Sayo spoke up. "I'd like to give you both a thorough check-up, you may have been given adult bodies when you fought against the Shadow Line, I'd like to make sure that all your wounds have healed."

"The wounds we got when we were active did not transfer into our child bodies." Hikari offered.

"Please, for our peace of mind?" Sayo requested.

"It's okay, Hikari-kun, Mom and Dad have been meaning to get us checked up for the past month."

"I'm counting on you, Sayo-nee."

Sayo, Sena, and Kagura left the room as Juru looked at his cousin with concerned eyes.

"If it's any consolation, we were given the choice to hang up our changers and continue to live as children, we were at risk of not being able to enjoy our childhood and remain as adults if we were continually exposed to the Darkness." Hikari offered.

"Of course, you didn't hang up your changers." Hakataminami responded bitterly.

"Muryou?" Takamichi went by his brother's side. "What's wrong?"

"I'm just galled at the irresponsibility of someone choosing children, a full team of children, to fight their battles for them."

"If that's the case why didn't you protest Juru's appointment as Kiramei Red?" Tametomo asked.

"I did not protest Juru-kun's appointment because without him we would all have been killed," Hakataminami stated. "That and I know how stubborn Fire can be."

"Oi!" The red crystal rocked himself harder.

"That and I was confident that the adults that the other Kiramei stones chose would back up the youngest team member, and I was glad not to be proven wrong." Hakataminami sighed. "Hikari-kun and Kagura-chan did not have that, all of them were children."

"Our sixth was an adult… technically." Hikari wasn't sure how to categorize Akira.

"Technically?"

"He was really a part of the enemy before we were recruited as ToQgers, but has defected and joined us as our sixth member."

"Are we talking about Akira-kun?" Kagura bounced her way back inside. "He was really funny." She giggled.

"Who, who's Akira?" Sena joined in.

Kagura began to narrate various stories about Akira.

Tametomo on the other hand went to the resident doctor's side.

"What's the verdict Sayo-nee?" Tametomo asked.

"She's perfectly healthy," Sayo assured the gamer. "There are no traces of injury on her."

Tametomo gave a sigh of relief

As Kagura continued narrating, while the others were listening, Juru approached his cousin and subtly pulled on his clothes.

Hikari looked at Juru and nodded before following his cousin towards Sayo who gestured for the both of them to follow her.

---------

"Juru please take your shirt off," Sayo asked. "I need to see if you have any injuries when you were with your cousin, thinking that you're unable to transform."

"Must be hard being a doctor and be on the front lines at the same time," Hikari commented as Sayo physically checked Juru's torso for any injuries.

"Not really," Sayo shook her head. "There are times when I had to attend to myself before I could check on the others, but so far, the others do a pretty good job on making sure I don't take too many hits," She began prodding Juru's bare torso for any broken bones." "What about your team, how do you treat your wounds?"

"We do them ourselves," Hikari answered bluntly. "If we're unable, Wagon-san, an android train vendor, is responsible for bandaging our wounds."

"From what I've seen of Kagura-chan's body, the vendor did a pretty good job." Sayo complimented.

"None of our wounds were carried over once our bodies returned to our original age." Hikari shook his head. "But yes, she does do a pretty good job."

"You might want to change the measurements of your uniforms, Juru-kun." Sayo suggested.

"All that fighting really made you fit huh, Ju-nii." Hikari teased. "Never thought I'd see my cousin develop muscles like that."

"He's a pretty good fighter, all things considered." Sayo praised. "Although, we did make the mistake of training him to the point that he fainted right in the middle of a fight."

"Regretting not taking Karate lessons with me?"

"Mou! Shut up, Hikari-kun." Juru pouted.

"Hikari-kun, please take your top off."

Hikari obliged.

"Just for context, I practice Karate to this day, any bruise you might find on me, is most probably due to that." Hikari stated before he stripped his top.

Apart from the boy's fit physique, there were indeed traces of faded bruises on the boy's torso, none of which would indicate that the boy had been in a long-standing fight against an enemy who wanted to kill him, despite what happened earlier in the day.

"I don't think ice is needed for the bruises you have, Hikari-kun." Sayo declared.

"Still, what are the Kurous doing here aiding the Yodom empire," Hikari wondered as he dressed himself.

"Maybe the Yodom empire and the Shadow Line joined forces?" Juru suggested.

"That's possible," Hikari hummed. "However knowing them as well as we knew them, they don't exactly join forces with factions other than their own."

"Earlier you claimed that the man in white wasn't someone named Zett," Sayo hummed. "Is it related?"

"Of course!" Hikari widened his eyes in realization. "Zett was the leader of the Shadow Line, as far as we know; he's still asleep and won't wake up anytime soon."

"How is this related?"

"It could very well mean that the Kurous were duped into helping the Yodom army." Sayo offered.

"I don't know if I should feel sorry for the impostor or not." Hikari winced.

"Why do you say so, Hikari-kun?" Juru curiously asked.

"I can only see two ways for the impostor to be defeated, and none of them involve us."

[acoatofgold]

Everybody’s Got A Story

Semi-coming out of retirement to publish this really rough story I wrote on Monday in a couple of hours. Its the second non-explicit story on here (the first is: Three’s A Fit) and I will now fade back into obscurity. Its actually Pre-Sueprcorp, its an AU, and its also pre-Supergirl.

Title: Everybody’s Got A Story

Or: How Lena Luther Learned to Connect With Others

--

What happens is this: The Luthor’s are cold and cruel and even at their most loving are distant and lying and Lena just wants to know the truth, for once. She has very vague memories of her mother, a woman with sad eyes and warm hands and a warm chest as Lena laid on her chest to sleep. When she wakes up, her mother doesn’t. Her lips are purple, like the bruises under her eyes. Lena tries to push her awake, to shove her into consciousness, and when that doesn’t work, she goes to the neighbor who watches her when Mom is at work and they call 911. In her memory, Father is there before the police. Perhaps he is there before the police, it wouldn’t surprise her, but she does know she never sees her mother again.

The first day in the Luther household, she remembers vividly: holding Father’s hand, running to keep up with his stride, and he barges in the household. “I’ve brought a child,” He says. “Her name is Lena.” Lillian stands in the foyer, half frozen, and Lex barrels in at full speed, wearing Lacrosse gear. He has a mass of curly red hair, like he’s on fire. “Meet your sister.” They shake hands. Father takes her passed Lillian, who is stock still, and they go to the study together. She sits on the floor and he does paperwork. He puts her to bed himself; a bath, pajamas with the tags still on, and a finger of brandy mixed with water “for your nerves”. Lionel reads his business agreement out loud until she falls asleep. When she wakes up, she is alone.

 Father is confident and cold and loves her as much as he is capable of loving anyone, which is not a lot at all. Lillian is capable of love but not for her – all of it belongs to Lex and Lex alone; strong Lex, smart Lex, brilliant Lex, Lex who has a string of heartbroken women, Lex who the rules don’t apply to; Lex who goes mad and tries to kill a god. He pleads insanity and Lena knows its fake, its orchestrated: Lex has never been clearer or more intense in his goals, but that comes later. As long as Lena has known him, Lex has half-assed everything, the result of being born with more money than many countries and zero consequences. Lex punches a boy at MIT for looking at him and returns the next semester. Lex crashes a yacht on his twentieth birthday. Lex crashes a yacht on her twentieth birthday and she wasn’t even there.

 Lex is but the product of how he was raised. And so is she.

 It’s why she surprises even herself when she heads into the college for journalism just twelve credits shy of her electrical engineering degree. She double majors, takes the extra eighteen months, and walks across her stage to no one. Father sends her a car and a bouquet of pink cosmos and there’s money in her account, more than she’s had before on her own. Lex calls, half drunk, to congratulate her and flays a corporate underling alive for interrupting him. Lena hangs up. He doesn’t call back.

 Father tells her he is sick shortly after she gets the job at the Tribune in National City, as physically far apart as two cities can be in the continuous country.

 She’s fixing herself dinner and lunch for the next day, with Father on speakerphone.

 “Are you sure you don’t want to live in the brownstone?” He asks her. “It’s just sitting there. I already pay the taxes on it.”

 “No, Father,” She replies. She’s chopping cucumbers for a Greek chicken salad. “I want to live on my own.”

 “You would live on your own. Just a maid to come in and clean. Practically monkhood.”

 “No, Father,” Lena repeats herself, turning a pan on medium.

 He grunts eloquently, clears his throat and says, “I want you here for my birthday. It’ll be my last.”

 “Father, please,” She scoffs. “You’re as healthy as –“

 “I’m dying, Lena.” His voice is quiet. “I’ve been dying. Been fighting it, knowing Lex wasn’t ready for the company and you’re uninterested. He’s finally doing something with himself, though, and you’re a grown woman now. I can go. I just want you to say goodbye.”

Her hands are shaking. She puts the knife down. “How long do you have?”

 Father scoffs, “Like I’d let any doctor tell me what to do. I’m having my birthday and I’m going to be euthanized now that there’s a civilized option.” His voice grows stronger, “I wouldn’t be able to stand it, pissing and shitting on myself, letting my mind go. No, not I. I’m going on my own terms.”

 Lena clears her throat, feeling her breath catch, “Okay, Father. I understand.”

 “Good,” He says. “So you’ll be here?”

 “Yes, Father. I’ll book my ticket tonight.”

 “Good.” He hangs up.

 Lena puts the chicken tenders in the pan, watches it sizzle for a moment, and then goes to her cabinet for a bottle of wine.

 She burns the chicken.

 --

The day prior to her father’s birthday is when she’s given her very first story. Its thirty miles out of the city center and James Olsen comes along. He’s very cold to her, which she expects, but his photographs are amazing so she tolerates his attitude even when they’re in her car. She drives at the speed limit but barely and watches suburbs turn into desert turn into a farm that looks mostly like a forest. The parking lot is all dirt and houses not one, not two, but three beat up turn of the century trucks, a school bus painted blue, a van missing all four tires on concrete blocks, and an ATV. On top of the ATV is a chicken and it clucks at them menacingly.

 “What the Hell?” Mutters Olsen under his breath.

 She ignores him but has the same sentiment. She steps onto dirt in her Balenciaga sneakers and thinks, for the first time, maybe Gucci was not appropriate. Its desert as far as the eye can see until they get to the “farm” and there it’s covered in so many plants that she can hardly see ten feet ahead of her. They walk down a rough approximation of a path and stop at the first building they see. It’s steel, tan, and fairly new, with an AC sticking out of a rough cut hole packed into place with foam spray. There’s a window with a bell on it and she rings it.

 A dirty young man comes out, his dreads tied back, dirt up to his forearms, and asks, “Y’all here for Kara?” He’s wearing a yellow t-shirt and cargo shorts held up by a shoestring. He’s thin, almost reedy, with an easy smile.

 Lena nods, “Yeah, we’re from the Tribune.”

 His head bobbles as he eyes both of them, “Cool, cool, lemme go get her.”

 He ducks around the two of them and takes off running. They stand in the heat for about three minutes before the young man comes back with an equally young woman, both running with long, familiar strides. It’s now that she notices that they’re both barefoot.

 “Hey,” The woman grins, all blue eyes and white teeth, “I’m Kara Kent.”

 She’s as dirt covered as her companion but thrusts out a hand anyways. She’s wearing jeans so worn that the holes are visible in both knees and a gray t-shirt that says “El’s Farm”. She wears a John Deere hat on top of neatly buzzed blond hair, blue eyes glimmering. Her shirt is tight around her arms, all muscle, and her jeans barely hold her thighs in place. Lena is immediately half in love. She’s always loved women who work with their hands. James shakes first and then Lena.

 “James Olsen,” Says James. Then, he asks, “You know a Clark? The last name is familiar.”

 Her grin widens, “My cousin. You must be Jimmy.”

 He clears his throat, “Just James, please.”

 Lena shakes as well, noticing a split blister on Kara’s thumb and that all of her fingers are rough.

 “I’m Lena Luther.”

 Kara’s smile turns sardonic, “The orphan that could. They used to talk about you all the time at my group home, before I got to live with Clark.”

 She blinks, “Really?”

 Kara nods, her grin more mischievous now, “Oh yeah. The nuns were crazy about you. They always told us if we were on our best behavior, we’d get adopted by a rich couple like you did. When you went to MIT, you’d’ve thought you walked on water. The Mother was so overcome with joy, she cried for a week.”

 Lena isn’t sure how to feel about it and it must show on her face because Kara laughs and claps her on the shoulder so hard she feels her knees buckle.

 Kara jerks her head, “C’mon, I’ll show you around. Virgil, finish with the microgreens and we’ll meet up at the greenhouse in twenty.”

 He gives her a thumbs up, waves to them, and goes back into the steel building.

 She does give them a quick tour – the path is an actual path and less meandering when they’re further away from the initial opening, concrete pavers with leaf and flower imprints leading the way – “we did those ourselves, s’why they’re all sorta shapes, this flower set is from a broccoli plant that bolted” - first to two more buildings she points out as the storage room and the cold room, both similar steel buildings to the first with more foam sprayed air conditioners.

 “What’s a cold room do?” Lena asks her phone already on record.

 Kara smiles at her, “Ya wanna wait until the end of the tour? I fully intend to give you a real interview away from the heat but I know Just James wants pictures before it gets dark out.”

 Lena can’t stop her own grin. Her makeup feels like it’ll sweat off at the rate of the temps outside.

 Kara leads them to the first building, opens it to show them thousands of hanging bulbs of onions and garlic.

 “We just finished our allium harvest of storage onions and garlic. Beat our record: twelve thousand. Ten thousand is in garlic and half of that will probably be broken up and sold or used as seed garlic, and the onions are eaten, given away, goes into our CSA box, go to the pigs. The works.”

 James makes her back up, moves Kara further inside, makes her take the hat off, and he moves himself until he gets the right picture. He clicks off three or four of them before they move onto the next building. Lena notes that each of the buildings they’ve passed has gutters and the gutters go to PVC pipe that leads above ground to the east.

  The cold room, she discovers, is a walk in refrigerator for cheap. There’s foam board insulation, bare to the eye, and the floor is concrete. It houses about thirty totes, each with masking top on one part. Lena takes a closer look at the closest one. “Arugula, 41 lbs.”

 “We harvest about seven to eight hundred pounds of produce during the summer, more if we do root vegetables. Everything’s already washed and sorted in here, we just combine for salad mixes or braising mixes by the totes. Only about half of these are filled.”

 Kara continues to show them the market garden: there are four blocks of twenty five rows, each dedicated to a family of crops and a station set up at the beginning of each block. Only three are in rotation; the other is covered in black tarps to lay fallow until next spring. Each block is home to a hedgerow of berries, in between the rows are flower beds, and in the back are ironwood trees.

 “Nitrogen fixers,” Kara explains, “And they do great in the desert as shade. Our water consumption was reduced a lot by that and we’re almost entirely off of on-site rain water. There’s a well on the property but with the drought, I never want to use it, so we occasionally truck it in from some of the other places that collect rainwater that haven’t used it all but we don’t use groundwater.”

 James takes pictures as they walk, sometimes all natural and sometimes posing Kara or one of about three workers, including Virgil who passes by them as James takes pictures of Kara with a hoe. He makes Virgil backtrack and the two weed in between the rows of beans, and then their hands and bare feet by the lettuce. He snaps a picture of a butterfly floating by one of the open marigolds.

 Kara leads them up the land, passed the crop field, passed the fallow field, and to the greenhouse. Lena is sweating buckets and James doesn’t look far behind but if it’s hot outside, the greenhouse is sweltering.

 “Oh my God,” Lena says aloud, involuntarily.

 Kara gives them both bottles of water from a cooler right inside the door.

 “Yeah, it’s about twenty degrees hotter in here than it is outside. This is where we keep our tropical plants and the hardening off station for our nursery plants.” She jerks her chin to the man inside, “Virgil is in charge of all our nursery plants and the microgreens. Timmy does our cut flowers and Kate and I handle the rest of the farm. Everybody works together on packing and harvesting day, though.”

 Virgil shakes his head, “What would you do without me?”

 She grins back, easy, rocking on her heels, “Suffer, obviously.”

 People who smile easily have always confounded Lena. She wasn’t a happy child and now as an adult, the idea that some people are just easy to get along with has never settled well with her. She’s awkward and always feels like an imposter when trying to be friendly. Confronted with two of them, she looks around and through the plastic to a whole different field outside, on the other side of the hill with a round, canvas building on top of it.

 “What’s that?” She asks.

 Kara turns back to her, her hands in her pockets, “There’s my yurt and beyond that is the field for seeds.”

 “You grow your own seeds?”

 Kara replies, pride in her eyes, “Fifty varieties of them. It’s really my passion, the market garden and CSA are cool, ya know, gets the bills paid-“

 Virgil snorts, “What bills, hillbilly?”

 Kara plows on, “But seed keeping and the animal breeding is what gets me up in the morning.”

 “Can we see?” Lena asks. Kara opens the door for them, “Absolutely.”

 She takes them to the field, helping Lena mind her steps over and behind the steep hill, walking with the surety of a goat. Closer, she sees that some of the plants are covered in translucent bags. Kara shows them the varieties – seven types of lettuce, three peppers, five tomatoes, ten types of flowers, two types of snap pea, several types of dried beans and peas, six types of broccoli, and lots of herbs.

 “All of these plants are from seeds I’ve either gotten over the years at garage sales or plant sales or seed sales, even church sales when they clean out the storage room, and the rest is from people in the area. Normally, they’re disenfranchised or undocumented people who want their family legacy to live on or even aliens.” She points to a section covered in chicken wire and green posts, “That’s the chicken area where we collect eggs for the CSA and local neighborhoods, and on this side –“ She does a 180, “Are the pigs. They eat all the scraps, all the weeds, and we have two breeding pairs right now, and all their purebred piglets go to be breeders. One is a Mangalista and the other is Red Wattle. They occasionally ignore me and crossbreed and when they do, we raise the babies and then process and sell to some restaurants in National City, like Donovan’s and Area 51. Apparently, that mix tastes exactly like a blurghap from Planet Xhiauovrat.”

 Kara pauses to put her hands on her hips and start stretching at the waist, bending so far backwards that her shirt slips and Lena is aware that her happy trail is also blond and she has abs. She takes a sip of her water and nearly chokes. Kara taps her on the back, nowhere near as staggering as the shoulder clap earlier, and she coughs her water up.

 As promised, Kara leads them to the yurt. It’s a decent size – nowhere near the size of a house but much larger than a tent. There’s a basin outside with a bar of soap and she washes her hands, feet, and face in the chill water that she throws down the hillside before she comes inside.

 “Shoes off at the door,” She calls and they follow. Lena’s got it a sight easier than James, who wore hiking boots.

 The inside of it is crowded but orderly and lovely. As soon as she walks in, she sees a coatrack that’s all windbreakers and hats. Kara’s John Deere hat is at the very top, the brim bent and dirty.  The floors are wooden, a different type than the deck outside, and the windows are up so light floods inside. She looks up to find that the roof is translucent and much closer than it appeared outside. There’s a full kitchen pushed against one side, a small table in the middle covered in folders and paper and a beat up laptop, a bouquet of flowers in a tin can, and on the other side is a library. There are shelves there, just covered in books from floor to ceiling, and what looks like a handmade sofa. It smells like lavender and mint inside. There are plywood walls about 2/3rds of the way down and Kara calls over her shoulder, “Let me wash my face again and I’ll sit out there with you. Take a seat anywhere.”

 Lena sits at the table, twisting her empty water bottle between her hands when James comes inside. He’s got his camera around his neck still and sits across from her.

 “Talk about all day,” Olsen says and Lena nods. She takes her bottle and puts it on the back of her neck.

 Kara emerges in a clean, white t-shirt and a face scrubbed so briskly her cheeks are pink. She’s beautiful, Lena realizes again, with her soft, red mouth and eyes like stars.

 “You guys want something to drink?” She asks.

 Olsen says no but Lena says, “Please.”

 Kara opens the fridge, “I’ve got water, raspberry sweet tea, orange juice, and milk.”

 “I’ll take the tea.”

 Lena wonders why she says “sweet” and not “iced” when she takes a sip. It’s sweeter than any drink she’s ever had short of a soda but tastes good. There are a lot of other flavors to it, a little bite of herbs and a distinctive tea flavor.

 Kara sits across from her and smiles her easy smile, “You want to just fire away or do you want me to start and you just jump in when you need clarification?”

 Lena licks her lips, thinking, and Kara’s eyes dart to her mouth then back to her eyes.

 “Were your parents into gardening? How’d you get into it?”

 Kara nods, cracks her neck audibly, and says, “Neither of my parents was into gardening. My father was a geneticist and my mother was working at the state attorney’s office when they died. It was why my aunt killed them; she was an extremist eco terrorist and my father was creating a new type of corn to outcompete the native types in Mexico and improving Roundup because of all the birth defects and bee deaths associated with it at the time. My mother was helping fight a lot of the class action lawsuits, throwing stuff out, pretending to lose paperwork, paying police officers to lose certain cases, that sort of thing. So she went over for lunch one Sunday and she killed them and then herself.

 “I was riding my bike home from a friend’s place, at the time, because my mom was supposed to pick me up. We were supposed to go to the science museum. We had a dog and he barked like crazy until one of the neighbors went to see what was going on and called 911. My aunt’s husband said he wouldn’t take me, so I was taken to a group home for six months while they tried to find some relatives. My closest relative was Clark and he’d been adopted as a baby when my aunt and uncle died in a car crash. My parents were out the country at the time and by the time they got back, he was already settled with the Kent’s. They didn’t really keep tabs on him. My uncle and father apparently never got along.”

 “You talked about living with nuns. Tell me about it? How’d you end up living with them?”

 “I lived with the neighbors for two weeks but I was – sad, a lot, and destructive so they took me to the Catholic Church that had an orphanage while the police tried to find Clark. I got counseling while I was there and I realized being angry wouldn’t get me anywhere with a buncha women in their fifties who served a higher purpose. I started smiling more and I realized I was happier smiling more. I’d just gotten used to it when they found Clark and Clark was twenty four; he didn’t really want a kid around at the time but he took me in and left me with his parents. Uncle Jonathan was a farmer in Kansas – and this is really what you think of as a farmer, he had the tractor and the overalls and the acres and acres of corn. Aunt Martha baked a lot, sold some of it but most of it was for neighbors, and when that wasn’t happening, she was planning for the school year. It bored me to tears. I was from Argo and I was used to a lot of extreme sports – mountain boarding and snowboarding and hiking trails and cave exploration, that kinda thing. I was doing kendo and krav maga every day after school. Smallville was four thousand people and eight thousand cows.”

 Olsen snorts and Lena bites her lips to keep from smiling.

 Kara rubs her eyebrow with the heel of her palm, “Yeah, I’m serious. I’d bike to the library and read all day and I was so keyed up I’d pace the halls all night. Couldn’t sleep. Drove Unc crazy. Lucky I was too short to reach the pedals or I’d have been in the tractor from sunup to sundown.”

 “So he inspired you to be a farmer?” Lena asks.

 Kara scoffs, “God, no. He complained the whole time and told me to make something of myself. I got into farming from books. I was riding home one night, I think just after the fourth of July, and passed this garage sale. Some guy ran out on his wife and she’d put all his stuff out there. Everything was a quarter and I mean everything. Pants, shoes, shirts? Quarter for the pile. Golf clubs? Quarter. Fishing poles? Quarter. His truck? Quarter. Once I realized she was serious, with Lara Smith in the truck, pulling off, I put my bike on the rack in the ATV and picked up all the books I could. Paid fifty cents. Made it right to the barn when it ran outta gas.” The longer she talked, the deeper her accent got. She’d sounded like any civilized Californian to Lena’s ear initially but now it was the sort of Midwestern accent she expected from somebody who’d grown up on a corn farm.

 “I went through the books and found he’d recently purchased two: Making Small Farms Work by Richard Perkins, which was about a permaculture setup in Sweden and The Market Gardener by Jean-Martin Fortier. Wasn’t a thumb print on them. They changed my life, particularly Fortier. He’s Canadian and works the French intensive method, like Eliot Coleman, and talked about farming in a way I hadn’t thought before, and about how to grow, why to grow certain crops, and the small startup costs. By the time I finished, I was behind Uncle Jon every day, asking –“ She pitches her voice up into the whine of a young teenager, one who’s voice hadn’t deepened any, “when I could have my own garden, I only needed two acres, I wouldn’t even need a tractor. He got so sick of me, he asked who I thought I was that I could go from never even seeing a plant grow to thinking I could make a living at it. I’ve never been a sensible person so I asked Aunt Martha if she’d talk to him about an acre or two and she said, ‘Well, if it were me, I’d buy the seeds first.’ So I bought seeds and she would just drag me by the nose from point to point, maybe thinking I’d give up. ‘Well, I’d need to start up the seeds first. Gee, let’s look up the planting date, oh no, what about water, golly where will we put ‘em, man, a garden is needed.’”

 Kara suddenly laughs, “She got me to put in a full acre garden by hand, muck stalls for the compost, clear weeds, clear brush, everything. I was using a chainsaw before I got my permit. Hell, I was using the truck to take brush to the back forty to burn for her. I pounded T-posts for two weeks and fenced in the garden the first time I saw a deer near my plants.”

 “How much did you make your first year?”

 “Two thousand. Uncle Jon charged me for gas, using his chain saw, using his field, using his T-posts, using his chicken wire, the whole nine yards. I think he made more off of me than he did farming.”

 Lena frowns, “That’s depressing. I’d have given up.”

 Kara shakes her head, “I couldn’t. By then I had a point to prove. I used my money to work on infrastructure – a taller fence, my own gas, seed, a seeder, a little greenhouse. I argued that I was supposed to get some money from mucking the stalls and Uncle Jon said it was my room and board and if I wanted more money, I’d have to do more around the house. I did laundry once and dyed all his undershirts pink and he said he’d pay me to leave him the hell alone. I was so serious about it that Aunt Martha promised to take me to Wichita’s farmer market if I could fill the truck bed and we’d borrow the tent and tables from the church. She may as well have cussed me, because by the time it was April, I had the truck full. Snow on the ground but there was –“ She sucked on her lip, her eyes far away, “I think a full tote of peas, a full tote of spinach, chard, carrots, leeks, and storage onions. I just put everything in plastic bags and handed it to the customers. I had butternut and acorn squash from the year before, still good in the cellar, so I figured Hell, may as well and took those too.”

 She settles back in her chair coolly, “I made more that first day than I’d made the year before selling in Smallville. It was fantastic. After that, I was hooked.”

 Kara is not the only one hooked; Lena can’t stop listening. Kara’s a good talker so there’s never really anything she needs to ask as Kara talks about succession planting and maxing out on an acre and planting with the seasons to maximize space.

 “What’s something you’ve never grown?” Lena asks her as she extols the virtues of steamed turnip greens.

 “Commercially? Cabbage. It’s too cheap to bother with for any semblance of a price. Broccoli is easier and more money than cabbage. Less slugs.”

 “Something you love?”

“Beans. Plant ‘em and they go.”

 “How’d you start saving seed?”

 Kara grins, “It was cheaper than buying tomato seeds. I picked the best of them and then I’d slice and freeze and when it was time for buying seeds, I’d bury it in about an inch of dirt and take all the babies and switch ‘em to plug trays.”

 “You’ve got quite a few seeds now, so how did you start saving so many if it was just for the money?”

 Kara licks her teeth, “We had old neighbors. Mrs. Hamilton was about six hundred when I was a kid, I’m talkin’ bout old. Just dusty. And if she was six hundred, her wife was about five hundred ninety nine plus or minus a day. They saw me hauling produce out the garden day after day and I’d given them some lettuce I hadn’t sold, a couple tomatoes. One day she asked me what I intended to do for beauty. I said I had no idea what she was talking about. She threw her hands up, had to grab the fence before she fell over, and made me come inside with her. I was a half-step behind in case she fell but she didn’t and I waited in the kitchen. She gave me a glass of lemonade, an oatmeal cookie, and a little half pint mason jar of seeds. “Those,” She told me, “are Bachelor’s Buttons, sometimes called cornflowers. It’s where cornflower blue comes from and it is the exact shade of my lovely bride’s eyes. You’ll grow them for beauty and the first blooms belong to my wife.””

 She smiled, taking a sip of her sugary tea, “Oh I was mad. I thought I’d been doing a good job of the garden, it was colorful, everything had some little splash to it, it was in a spiral pattern. I was growing in abundance. I realize now I was insecure that she thought because my work wasn’t beautiful but functional that I would not be beautiful as an adult, simply functional. I had never worried about being beautiful before that – my parents were liberals and insisted that a child not be told they’re beautiful because it would make the child hinge their entire personality on it. They preferred that I be functional so I was told I was a strong girl, not a pretty girl, or an excellent athlete or a wonderful baker, that sorta thing. Lots of adjectives.”

 “Did you plant the flowers?”

 “Of course I did. I didn’t want to but by the time I made it inside, Mrs. Hamilton had called Aunt Martha, and she watched me go right out there and plant the seeds and water them. They were lovely flowers. I did bring the first bouquet to the Hamilton’s and then I sold some but I figured, “Whatever” and saved the seeds. I still have some. I plant a few every year just to save the seed.”

 Lena asks, “Were the rest given to you?”

 Kara nods, “Oh yeah. Small town like Smallville? Somebody young doing the planting, they ask you plant everything. I had beans from the statehood growing up one side of a trellis by cucumbers from somebody’s grandma from Armenia. Everybody had a tomato plant they needed growing. Everybody had a story to tell. Why’s that your favorite flower?”

 She is pointing to the bouquet on the table, sitting in a tin can of water.

 Lena blinks, confused, “It’s not.”

 “Well, what is?”

 Lena frowns, thinking, but James answers, “Chrysanthemums. My grandfather wore one every Sunday.” He smiles, “It always made me feel grown up when he’d put one in my lapel. We didn’t even go to church; we’d just put the flowers in and go for dinner together.”

 Kara nods, “And that’s why I do it. I preserve memories, I preserve families and histories and hurts with those seeds. The journey passes from person to person with those.” Kara blinks her eyes, glances at her oven and asks, “Want to stay for dinner?”

 Lena wants to. She’s sure James does too but she’s got a flight early tomorrow morning to the other side of the country and sees her father for what’s probably the last time.

 She grimaces, “I wish. I gotta type this up and then I’ve got a flight tomorrow.”

 Kara frowns, “Aw, that’s too bad.” She stands up and walks them all the way to Lena’s car, her hands in her pockets, and the John Deere hat on her head backwards.

 The chicken is sleeping on the ATV and she clucks, eyes narrowed, and sidles up to it. Lena is strapping into her seat but pauses to watch her walk sideways to a sleeping chicken, put a hand over it, and then grab and truss it under her arm.

 “This is Bonnie,” Kara introduces them. “She likes to run away.”

 Lena watches her go most of the way to the path, before the bend when she’s out of sight because of the ironwoods, and leans her head out her own window, “Hey, Kara!”

 Kara turns, light on her feet.

 “It’s cosmos! My father sent them for my college graduation!”

 Kara’s grin lights up her face and she walks the path backwards.

 The drive home is almost as silent as the drive to the farm. “She’s different from Clark,” Olsen finally says. “Hard to imagine they grew up in the same house.”

 Lena doesn’t say anything and Olsen stops making conversation. They listen to Lana Del Rey the whole way home.

--

Lena’s flight is direct and she lands just in time to catch an Uber to the mansion before the price surges.

 “This your place?” Her driver asks with a thick accent. Lena nods, grabs her backpack, and exits the car. Security lets her in immediately. Her key still works and she walks into the foyer like she did over two decades ago.

 Lex is in the piano room and Lillian in the kitchen. Lex smiles but it’s thin and doesn’t reach his eyes. Lillian is shaking slightly and Lena avoids her. Father is in his study, as always, and perks up just slightly when she walks in.

 “Lena,” He says and stands and they touch cheeks. He gives her a sheet of paper, ink still wet at the bottom. She knows it’s his will before he even hands it to her and she pushes it aside.

 His eyebrows rise over familiar green eyes, “No questions?”

 She responds, “Just one.”

 Father says without her asking, “You are my biological child. Lex didn’t know; Lillian did.”

 Her mouth parts and all that comes out is a tiny, “Oh.”

 He opens the scotch and grabs two tumblers. He pours two fingers in one and one in another.

 “Do you still take it with water?”

 She nods and he pours a finger of water in the glass, sliding it to her.

 She sips and he gulps, his silver streaked hair catching in the light. It makes her think of Kara and it gives her the courage to say, “Father, my question.”

 Father slams the glass down. “That wasn’t it?”

 She shakes her head, “No.”

 His brows furrow, as if what else could she possibly have to ask him but he says, “Go on, Lena-girl.”

 “What’s your favorite flower?”

             END

[sweetmeatdale]

I feel like the Arrowverse shows have a unique way of working around the character pools they are/are not aloud to use

To put it simply they have a specific way they’re able to name drop things without the pressure to actually show the things they’re alluding towards because that’s just simply not the story we’re telling right now (I’m gonna ramble with that point after this so here’s your warning about that)

Arrow gets to mention Oracle and Bruce Wayne and Gotham but they don’t need to show it because right now we’re watching Oliver Queen and his journey

Flash can show us Ferris Airfield and their missing pilots or show us a bunch of peeks at other DC universe cities and even say Kid Flash fought a giant starfish from space when he was away but it’s not part of the story we’re currently here for, we’re here to see Barry and the Team at S.T.A.R. Labs

We can get glimpses of the simultaneous battles for justice across the multiverse through Jay Garrick and Jessie Quick but while we’re fascinated with that we want to finish the story we’re watching on Earth 1

Shows like Supergirl and Constantine can start on other networks and be woven into the existing mythos because those workarounds left room for other things to exist and there was never a point when it was explicitly said that didn’t exist so there’s no reason they couldn’t exist

The Justice Society and Wildcat can exist in the past of that universe an Go unaddressed because they aren’t the kind of people who feel the need to mention that what they’re doing has been done before

Supergirl can go an entire season without showing Superman and when he does show up it doesn’t overshadow her because its not his story it’s hers

Legends of Tomorrow can show us Themescera in ancient times but Wonder Woman would have no importance then so there’s not a need to show her, the story was about Helen of Troy so that what we see

Supergirl can mention Lex Luthor is in prison after a battle with Superman and go on to have Supergirl have her own interactions with othe Luthors because they’re the people she knows and interacts with within her city

Black Lightning can have Anissa go to a party where people are dressed as superheroes and they don’t need to clarify if the heroes people are dressed as are real or fictional to them because that’s not the point

Supergirl can show us visions of Zod but we don’t need to see how he was banished to the Negative Zone, Oliver can mention he can’t call Constantine because he’s in Hell, the legends can avoid bringing the two versions of Vixen together and justify it with a paradox avoidance, Black Lightning can mention not only that other superheroes exist in their world but show other DC properties in comic books and then mention Vixen and Supergirl but it doesn’t actually need to explain which of the two those are because they aren’t the stories they’re telling right now

Like I realize a lot of these things apply to to the Easter eggs in the MCU and DCEU but I feel like the Arrowverse is able to do it so much more because there’s no definitive limit on what else exists out there so far, for all we know they could confirm later on that the Titans show DC is planning is could be on Black Lightning’s earth or any of the other ones they’ve shown so far and it wouldn’t be all that surprising. They could retcon the show Powerless into their mythos and it’d be believable if they really wanted to.

They know they’re working with limits, they know they have characters that the other DC works won’t let them show but the can do so much just short of actually showing and in my opinion it just works for them so far.

[canaryatlaw]

okay, let's go. tonight was good but most of the day leading up to it was either blah or difficult, depending on the task at hand. I got up and had court, it was a super easy day where it was just me and we only needed a quick update, so they put me into the courtroom feed before the camera in the court had turned on, which I found pretty amusing. The judge showed a minute or so later, and then I was done with court at like, 9:10 am, so that was a nice change. I was otherwise supervising clinic, which was either moments of me having nothing to do at that moment or intense focus trying to figure something out, especially with one of the cases today which required some intense scrutiny from my whole work team. We didn't get anything filed, which was unfortunate, but I have two cases signed and ready to be submitted first thing tomorrow, and another one hopefully not far behind it. I also had a chat with my supervisor about this deposition we have to do tomorrow, which I'm super not looking forward to and feel very anxious about. I'm trying to remember not everyone knows legal terminology; a deposition is a pre-trial action where the lawyers from the other side get to ask the party questions, much like a cross-examination at trial. It can have several uses, one being to obtain information they don't have yet, or them trying to get a specific statement on the record that could be used as impeachment (basically the other side presenting evidence that you were not truthful about something in your testimony) evidence at trial. Honestly I'm not sure what they think they're going to get out of this, they already have an 8 page amended affidavit with all our claims, and I'm just concerned their motive here is try to make my client upset and do something wrong, whatever that could be. I can't go into the case, but there are a lot of cultural influences on the marriage, and it seems like the husband is very much relying on said influences and their treatment of married woman for the case, so that's kind of challenging because she's been abused for so long and is honestly pretty fragile, and I really just don't want to make it worse for her. The worst part is that almost all of it I just have to sit there and not be able to do anything (there are certain objections I can raise, but they're very limited, and most of the time it's just the objection being noted for the record and the client still has to answer the question, so not super helpful. This is also definitely not a normal thing for us to deal with in cases. generally happens when the abuser hires a lawyer that doesn't know what they're doing in an order of protection case and try to apply other legal procedures which are really just not applicable here, and like I said I don't know what they think they're going to find out, and I of course always google opposing counsel, and it was clear in this case that the lawyer chosen was picked for cultural reasons, not expertise in order of protection cases, so this will be interesting. I just feel very anxious about the whole thing, and my supervisor is going to be there with me (on Zoom) but she's mostly just for background support and potential discussions during any breaks taken, but it's going to be on my shoulders as to what to object to, and really I just don't want to look like an idiot. There's this terrible trend in our cases where abusive men with hire male lawyers who are just as full of shit as they are, and it makes it incredibly difficult to deal with them. I haven't seen much of opposing counsel actually in action here, but by the documents I received from them I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case. but now I'm ranting and totally off the topic of today, I just really needed to get that all out. anyway, today. so we got those cases set for the morning and I did our new timekeeping procedure which is a giant pain in the ass, so super happy about that being in place going forward. A bit after 5 I got a text from friend that they were leaving work and heading to my apartment for us to get taco bell and go to

target, so I got ready (I didn't actually change because the "pajamas" I was wearing were technically just clothes because I'm out of proper pajamas again, so I mostly just put my bra on and such, lol) and she arrived not long after that. so we did our regular trip to the taco bell, and then parking in the home depot parking lot next door to eat our food. They're a really cute like walk up window ice cream place across the street from the taco bell, and it somehow got up to 80 today which is wild, so it was swarmed with people, and now I really just want that in my life lol because I do love many different ice creams, but vanilla soft serve (with sprinkles or chocolate crunchies) has a special place in my heart, so I always like that. so I need to get some soon. After we were done eating we drove over to target and did our shopping, a few random food items and some pharmacy stuff, then paid and left, friend dropped me at home from there. I took a few minutes to situate everything, then realized The Flash was probably airing right then, so I turned the tv on and clicked to start the episode from the beginning and fast forward the commercial breaks in an attempt to make it to the live airing. I'm really not invested in the flash very much to begin with, but this episode was such a filler episode it was really losing it. part of it was about a time loop, and okay, when writers go with tropes like that it's because they're really running out of ideas (there is an exception for legends of tomorrow here because they're in a different category of shows entirely, and in one where a time loop makes complete sense to happen, not to mention their time loop episode is generally regarded as one of the best episodes of the series, because Tala Ashe is really fucking good and it was really fucking good). so that was my observations there. While I was still watching it, a friend tweeted asking about my opinion on the Supergirl courtroom scenes that was playing after the flash, so I went straight into watching that. As expected for the Arrowverse, the courtroom scenes were complete bullshit, and they even tried to get some legal jargon in there but use it in an entirely incorrect premise (you can't just yell 'fruit from the poisonous tree" whenever you feel like it, and yes that is actual legal jargon). so that was too be expected anyway. the rest of the episode was fine I guess, not super interested in their plots going on, I'm here for the Luthors lol. when that ended, I watched a few episodes of Freaks and Geeks, which was amusing, especially with baby James Franco, and the girl who goes on to play Velma in the live-action Scooby Doo movies as the main character, so knowing that context was funny. After a few episodes I started getting ready for bed and now I'm here and I REALLY did not want to make this as long as it ended up being, but sometimes you just gotta let it out I suppose. oh well, time to go to bed now for sure. Goodnight sweeties, enjoy your Wednesday.

[kassebaum]

Hey if you're up for any prompts how about Supercorp at a halloween party?

Not a HP prompt, but a smutty halloween Supercorp prompt!

Eversince Kara’s first Halloween party where she had misunderstood theinstructions of ‘dress as what scares you most’ and had turned up ina home-made costume of a toaster made out of cardboard, she had stuckto the more ‘traditional’ costumes.

Thisyear she had decided on a vampire- black leather pants that showedoff all her curves, a black corset that pushed her breasts up, andknee high boots over the leather trousers.

Hermake-up was smokier than usual and her hair styled to look more akinto Supergirl’s curls rather than the usual Kara Danvers look,loosely falling down her shoulders.

Bloodred lips with a glimpse of fangs peeking out completed her look.

Shetold herself she hadn’t picked the sexiest costume she could findbecause she wanted a certain brunette CEO to notice her.

Shetold herself that the lunch dates between her and Lena had becomemore frequent because that’s just what friends did.

Shetold herself that Lena was just being friendly when she held ontotheir hugs for seconds longer than was strictly necessary.

Karawalked in to the ballroom that had been decorated for the annual L.Corp Halloween party. She smoothed out the non existent wrinkles fromher trousers one last time and looked back up, her eyes searching forLena.

Kara’seyes went wide the moment she saw the CEO; Lena was wearing aSupergirl costume… a very good Supergirl costume…

AsKara remembered how to breath, she walked closer to Lena and realisedthe costume was almost toogood to be a costume- it was almost an exact replica of her actualsuit!

Hereyes roamed over the gorgeous woman in front of her; from the kneehigh red leather boots and the pale skin of her bare thighs, to theincredibly short skirt that was even shorter than the one in Kara’scloset. Her eyes finallylanded on Lena’s chest and the House of El crest emblazoned acrossit, her stomach flipped a little to see the woman wearing the symbolof her house.

Thefact that Lena had decided against a blonde wig, and had insteadchosen to keep her natural colour and wear her hair down took Kara’sbreath away.

Lenawas similarly experiencing what she figured to roughly be her 79thgay panic in direct relation to Kara Danvers. Those pants were fartoo tight and Lena actually brought her hand up to her mouth to checkfor drool at witnessing Kara’s bare biceps. There was no way she wasmaking it through the evening without slipping up about her feelingsfor the reporter.

‘Lena!’Kara exclaimed when she was within normal human hearing range, ‘youlook amazing!’

‘Lookinggood yourself’ Lena blushed at the compliment, ‘do I have toworry about you wanting to take a bite of me?’

‘Onlyif you ask nicely…’ Kara winked, surprising herself at her ownbrazenness.

Beforeshe could respond, Lena’s attention was pulled away to sort anissue in the kitchen.

Shesettled for leaning in close to Kara’s ear and whispering ‘Save adance for me later?’ She smiled as the reported shivered at thebreath tickling her ear.

Shemarched quickly to the kitchen, leaving a flustered reporter behindher, and swiftly dispensed judgement on the chef’s conundrum ofwhether to serve the next round of canapés without theiraccompaniment as it had failed to arrive from the supplier. Once thatwas sorted, Lena quickly headed back out to the party, deciding thatshe was done playing coy with Kara; she was making a move…

Itwas another hour before Lena was able to break away from her hostingduties to speak to Kara again, but every few minutes their eyes metacross the room, lust evident in every glance.

Finally,Lena was able to politely break free from her conversation with theMetropolis mogul she had been chatting with and sidled up behindKara. The music from the DJ was blaring out as a mix of costumedbodies moved on the dance floor. Lena gently rested her hand onKara’s bare arm to get her attention.

‘Youreally look incredible tonight and I believe you owe me a dance…’

Shetook the drink from Kara’s hand, placed it on a nearby table andpulled Kara to the edge of the dance floor.

Themusic thumped around them and in the dim corner of the dance floortheir lips were inches away from meeting.

Outof nowhere a member of Lena’s staff appeared, her attention yetagain required elsewhere.

Lenalooked at Kara apologetically, she spoke quietly to her assistant,but Kara heard every word.

‘I’lltake the call in my office, but after that no more interruptions’

Theassistant nodded and moved away to make the necessary arrangements.Lena turned back to Kara ‘Give me 10 minutes?’

Karanodded and watched Lena head towards the elevator, the one that ledto her private office, winking at her and mouthing ‘my office’just as the doors closed.

Karaspent the next 9 minutes and 50 seconds pacing the ballroom, chasingdown the servers scattered around the room with platters of deliciousfood. Deciding she had waited long enough, she raced towards thestairway, taking the steps two at a time.

Uponreaching the correct floor, Kara found the door to Lena’s officeajar. She pushed lightly on the door which swung open to reveal Lenaperched on the edge of her desk.

‘Closethe door’ She whispered, and Kara obeyed.

Sheturned back and watched as Lena walked over to her, her eyes slowlyraking over her body, no longer subtle in her glances, before a smirkappeared on her face. Kara’s heart was pounding, Lena held out herhand and led her further into the office.

Karatried to speak, but was silenced by Lena pressing her lips againsther own, her tongue flicking out before seeking entry into her mouthas she backed her towards the door.

Karatangled her hands into Lena’s hair, kissing back with equalpassion, her fingers scratching Lena’s scalp.

Lenapushed Kara up against the closed door, her thigh pushed into Kara’score, eliciting a moan from Kara as her head fell back against theoak wood door. Lena moved in, alternating between placing lightkisses and sucking hard on Kara’s exposed neck. Kara started togrind down onto Lena’s thigh, desperate for some kind of friction.

Lenapulled back slightly to take in the sight of Kara; the contrastbetween her curled blonde hair and black leather, lips slightlyswollen with Lena’s lipstick smudged down her neck.

Lena’shands came up, running her hands over Kara’s leather clad torso,before growling in frustration at the lack of movement the corsetoffered. She spun Kara around, who braced herself against the door asLena started to unlace her corset.

Finallyunlaced enough, Kara pulled it off over her head and immediatelyfound herself back in her earlier position with her back pressedagainst the door, Lena’s hands on her breasts, thumbs brushingagainst her nipples, teasing and rolling them between the pads of herfingers. At every change of pressure Kara would whimper and grinddown against Lena’s thigh.

Unableto keep herself from touching Lena any longer Karapicked Lena upand walked to thecouch, sheplacedheron it and swung one legover to straddleher. She broughttheir lips back togetherin a passionate kiss asLena’s hands restedon Kara’s waist and slowly slid down until they cupped Kara’sarse, she gently squeezed and kneaded the flesh throughthe leather as Kararolled her hips.

Kara’shands started touching everything they could reach, palming Lena’sbreasts thought the material of her incredibly high quality replicaof her Supergirl suit, fingers teasing Lena’s nipples.

Kara’shands travelled lower and pushed up the red skirt, rubbing thematerial of Lena’s knickers.

Lena’ships started to roll, her head falling against the back of the couch,her gasps and moans filled the air; until she uttered a single word;‘more..’.

‘Tellme what you want Lena’ Kara husked as she continued to rub circlesdirectly over Lena’s clit.

‘Ineed you inside…’ Lena panted out, raising her hips.

Karaslid her hand inside Lena’s knickers, running her fingers through thewetness, her other hand going back to roll one of Lena’s nipplesbetween her fingers and at the same time slowly entering Lena withtwo fingers, moaning as she feltLenastretch to accommodate them.

Lena’shead fell back to hit the top of the sofa as her mouth opened in anattempt to gasp in more oxygen.

‘Faster’Lena demanded and her moans became louder as Kara complied,reverberating round the office as Kara drove her closer and closer torelease. Sensing Lena was close, Kara moved her other hand down toapply direct pressure to Lena’s clit. Instantly Lena’s hips buckedagainst Kara’s hand as she came.

Karaflopped onto the sofa next to Lena, kissing her neck, her lips, hershoulders- any part of Lena she could reach.

‘Ihave to admit, I didn’t see today ending like this…’ Karagiggled.

‘Mmmmm,the day is not over yet!’ Lena smirked and rolled to pin Kara tothe couch.

Theywere found by Jess the following morning, cuddled up on the sofa,parts of their costumes strewn across the floor. Jess smiled as sherealised she’d won the office pool.