Chapter Text
Lena thinks that, at least by now, she knows how grief and pain and loss feels, despite the fact the whole world thinks she is some cold, unfeeling bitch (they are not wrong, sometimes, because it’s better not to feel). She loved her family dearly—loves, perhaps, though some days she finds herself feeling otherwise—and it hurt: Lex’s downfall, Lillian’s betrayal.
Then there was Jack. Brilliant, loving, ambitious Jack. She did love him, loved him, beyond both their faults, and it broke her when she had to move away from the place that choked her with prejudice.
It broke her further to make the choice between him and National City’s darling daughter. If she were a Luthor, a real Luthor in flesh and blood and anger and vengeance, like everyone else have been saying, she could have chosen the love of her life over Supergirl. He was innocent, after all, only wanted to try to save the world in his own way, like what she has been trying to do—build a name for herself and veer away from the one she has to live with.
But no, she had to make a decision, one that she does not regret, not at all, but it does not mean it did not come with the pain of loss, and the images of Jack joining Lex and Lillian in her nightmares, calling her a worthless traitor who deserved to live with the weight of their ruined lives and burn in hell with the rest of them.
She dealt with it like she dealt with her prior experiences: with the delicious burn of work and whiskey, because what better way to channel grief other than projects that could potentially change the course of human history, right?
So of course, Lena thinks that, at least by now, she knows how grief and pain and loss feels, and she wonders if the sorrow that flits across Kara Danvers’ soft features was how it manifests. The bright smile she is used to is tainted, like an expression worn for the sole purpose of keeping out questions like what’s wrong and how have you been.
She first sees it when Kara visits, telling her of Morgan Edge buying off CatCo. It takes all of Lena’s pride and courage to say that dear god, I miss you , and she hopes that her fucking stutter wasn’t that obvious, but her words seemed to not matter then.
She apologizes about Mon-El. His name clearly brings back painful memories, with the hurt becoming more obvious on Kara’s eyes, the sadness peering through the mask she wears for a moment.
Lena hates herself for the part she had played in it. Rhea had used a weakness she didn’t really know she had. She hated herself for it, for bringing ruin and destruction to the city that she had hoped was her sanctuary, but she loathed herself more for what it had brought to Kara’s life. Her need for a mother’s love took Mon-El from Kara, and Lena hopes there was something she could do to at least make up for it, because everything was all her fault.
(She fears Edge is right, that everything she does at this point is mere reparation for her sins, and no matter how much she tries to help out, at the end of the day she’d end up being nailed to a cross or hung like a witch, burned at the stake by the only person she knows and trusts, all for the crimes she had done.
Or maybe the guilt she has to live with is punishment enough.)
The CEO invites the blonde for brunch, her voice hopeful. Guilt is bile in the back of her mouth, bitter and acidic and it makes her want to hurl but maybe, just maybe, they could talk. Maybe the reporter would open up to her, like she used to. They were best friends, after all. Instead, Kara just shrugs, walks away, and there is a lingering ache Lena feels in her chest as she watches her do so. She couldn’t place what it was, just swallows the guilt as she returns to her seat to bury herself in her work. At least work needs her. Or so she hopes, anyway.
She feels her best friend fading away. The bubbly, happy, sunny Kara Danvers was gone, replaced by a shadow who buried herself in work. Much like her, Lena thinks, and she only realizes now how unhealthy it has been.
She tries to help Kara out, once, with Lena bringing up Mike or Mon-El or whatever his name was, but the reporter just snaps. It’s personal, Kara says, and she’d rather not talk about it when she was at work. The words stung, surprisingly, and Lena barely manages to school her features into something neutral as she crosses her arms defensively, building back up walls she’s managed to bring down for one Kara Danvers.
“I did not spend 750 million dollars on a company as a favor to a friend,” she says coolly, but she knows in herself that was a lie. Guilt settles in her core as she speaks, but she grounds herself and thinks this is business, just business, and work is something she should be able to handle with her eyes closed and limbs broken so long as her brain is functioning.
It was easier to pretend she is talking to someone else, someone who isn’t Kara Danvers, who had sadness in her eyes and grief on her lips, but she does it anyway. She tells Kara to do her job, properly this time, and she immediately regrets it with how the reporter seemed to curl up into herself. Lena walks away, but stops on her way to wherever her feet would take her with her lack of desk at CatCo.
She watches Kara walk away once more, and she bites her lip to distract herself from the pain that finds its way back to her chest, as if clawing to get out. She excuses herself, tells James that she’ll return to L-Corp for the rest of the day, and when she gets to her office she asks Jess to bring in the paperwork she had to work on.
Whiskey kept her company that night, thoughts of Kara lingering in her head as she read through various contracts and business proposals. With her blinds closed, she doesn’t notice the time pass, and the pile of work she was working on lessened, at the very least. There is a knock on the door and Lena sighs, looking up. It was Jess, who looks at Lena, surprised.
“Y-your coffee, Miss Luthor,” she says, almost squeaks.
Lena furrows her eyebrows. Only then does she notice the way her eyes stung. She blinks a couple of times. “Jess. You’re still here? It’s quite late.”
Jess mostly just looks confused as she walks in, setting the mug of hot cappuccino on Lena’s table, piled with different folders and papers. Her secretary tells her it’s eight in the morning now, and Lena snorts, rather uncharacteristically, and her eyes widen when she realizes Jess isn’t joking. She curses under her breath, and with her newfound awareness, she feels hunger and fatigue rush in. She sighs and does her best to get up on her shaky knees. She instructs Jess to handle the paperwork she had finished and to cancel her morning meetings as she prepares to go home.
She asks her driver to pick up something on their way back to her penthouse. She fiddles with her phone on the way, shoots a few emails. Kara’s inbox has been quiet for some time, her second invitation to brunch left unanswered for the third day. She smiles sadly, remembers the way Kara’s ocean eyes, which always seemed to shine with happiness and ease before, had become clouded with grief. Something heavy settles on the pit of her stomach and she chalks it up to hunger.
Lena comes home and forces herself to eat, before collapsing on her bed in her fatigue.
She wakes up from a phone call, the device vibrating in her pocket. With a soft grumble she fishes it out and answers it, clearing her throat before she speaks. “Lena Luthor speaking,” she says softly, her voice scratchy from sleep.
“Hey,” the voice answers, and all traces of unconsciousness leaves her as she sits up at the sound of Kara’s voice. “I’m sorry- W-were you asleep? This was a bad idea, I shouldn’t have-”
Lena cuts her off there. “It’s alright,” she assures, and she runs her hand through her hair nervously. “Did you need something?”
Kara hesitates before speaking again. “I.. Yes. I talked to your source and I had a few leads.” A sigh. Lena bites her lip in worry but she stays quiet. “I was wondering if you wanted to discuss it. Over brunch.”
The brunette’s eyes widen at the offer. Lena was the new owner of CatCo, sure, but she is also quite certain that if Kara needed to run anything by anyone, it should be with her editor. Still, it was brunch with Kara, an invitation from her of all things after many rejected and unanswered offers from Lena, so she accepts. She asks Kara where she wants to meet. Noonan’s, she replies, in an hour, and Lena only realizes it was only almost ten in the morning. The CEO agrees and hangs up with a promise she’ll be there promptly.
She showers and dresses herself in a white blouse and a black high-waisted skirt. Business as usual, despite her excitement about her brunch with Kara. She catches herself smiling as she put on blood red lipstick, her war paint of sorts, only then realizing what this brunch might entail. She grows even paler as she imagines the redness on her lips as Mon-El’s blood.
(Logically, she knows she did not kill him. She could never. She sent him away at the very least, though Kara would say that was Supergirl’s call, but isn’t death a surer end than being lost in space?)
Guilt seeps through her veins yet again when she thinks of the worst. Kara might end their friendship with this brunch. She might blame Lena, confirm the CEO’s thoughts of this being all her goddamn fault, and the expensive lipstick falls on the immaculate white floor of her bathroom, staining the tiles with bright red. She wipes her lips hurriedly with tissues, harshly, leaving her lips pink and raw.
She forces herself not to cry when Kara cancels their brunch ten minutes before they were set to meet because of some emergency. She tries her best not to think of the worst, but her hands shake as she types a reply and tells Kara it’s okay.
(It’s not.)
She returns to L-Corp instead, sending herself to the forefront of most promising projects despite the weird look Jess sends her way. She buries herself in work, manual this time, as she helps her scientists figure out what’s wrong with what, like she used to do when she was nineteen, in the garage of an apartment she rented with Jack Spheer. It almost makes her feel normal, like she had a purpose.
(Like she wasn’t a Luthor with the blood of the innocent in her hands.)
It’s late in the evening, when the last engineer bid her goodnight, that she realizes she had spent the whole day focused, for once. It was refreshing, almost, but at least she doesn’t end up thinking about Kara or Mon-El or the worsening guilt in her stomach or the pang in her chest when she finds no message from her best friend about a rain check.
She supposes she doesn’t deserve that title now, and Kara cancelling their brunch makes sense all of a sudden. Lena laughs hollowly, the sound echoing through the laboratory she had holed herself in. It shouldn’t affect her so much, losing a friend, since she didn’t have many—or god, any —to begin with, but somehow she’s reminded of the loss she felt with Jack.
There was the sting of unshed tears in the back of her eyes, burning, but she wills herself not to cry. It wasn’t her place to cry, not when it was her fault Kara lost Mon-El, but a voice in the back of her head tells her it’s okay, because she lost Kara too. She sniffles but she doesn’t cry, instead tells her secretary and her driver to go home and not wait for her anymore.
She manages to finish a prototype the team had been working on, and it was two in the morning when Lena decides to take a cab back to her apartment. She waits on the curb without a coat, the cold air making her shiver, but she only stares forward. Her hands felt numb, and when she looks down on them, she sees blood, and she silently thanks the darkness of the area where she stands as she finally lets herself cry. Barely. Hot tears roll down her cheeks and she hastily wipes them, cursing herself as she summons the Luthor part of her, willing herself to fucking shut up. She shouldn’t cry. She wasn’t allowed to cry, not when this was all her fault.
Supergirl has been working nonstop. That much she at least heard of, with the small TV playing at the lab where she had stayed for the past week or so. She wasn’t sure how long it’s been. Supergirl was trying to help the city recover after the Daxamite invasion, and Lena took it upon herself to at least help out, since, well, it was her fault after all. She had buried herself in work (and whiskey, hidden in a flask that her employees pretend they don’t see), weekends became regular work days, and paperwork was settled during the night when everyone had gone. She doesn’t remember the last time she had a proper meal, or even gone home, having sent Jess to buy her new clothes so she could shower at the L-Corp gym when she needed to shake some feeling into her exhausted body.
She tries to ignore the way Jess looks at her, instead basks in the awe of the team of scientists she leads. They dissect the technology Jack had used with his nanobots so L-Corp could replicate it, not for medical reasons but for infrastructural—have machines build buildings and roads and bridges ruined during the invasion without risking human casualties, at a faster rate.
The project consumes her mind and body, at least enough that she doesn’t have to think about how Kara still hasn’t reached out. There have been emails from James, Jess had informed her, about him checking up on Lena and asking why she hasn’t been around despite her promise to stay there full time for now. She swallows the guilt when she remembers Kara and she shakes her head. She tells Jess to reply to him, to tell him that she was needed in L-Corp.
It wasn’t exactly a lie. At least her work needed her.
She doesn’t know what day it is, but her phone rings incessantly on her back pocket. She sighs and puts down the experiment results she was reading through before fishing her phone out, only to almost drop it when she reads who it was.
Kara.
Lena clears her throat and answers it with a soft hello.
“I’m here in your office but Jess says you won’t be coming back until the evening, and when I said I could wait for you since it’s past six anyway, she said by ‘evening’ she meant almost midnight,” Kara replies, all in one breath. It almost seems like the old Kara she knew and Lena smiles wistfully. “The fact that she looked worried telling me about it makes it seem like this isn’t the first time.” The tone was almost accusatory, and Lena sighs.
“I’ve been busy,” she says softly.
There is only silence on the other line, and when Kara speaks again, her voice is softer.
“Will you at least get dinner with me?” She asks. The feeling of hope blooming in Lena’s chest is dampened by guilt yet again, and she stares at the monitor. She doesn’t say anything for a few moments, and Kara continues. “Please. I.. I know I’ve been… Away. For some time. And I-” There is a muffled sound from the other line, and Lena wonders if Kara was crying. “I need my best friend,” she says finally.
Just like that, Lena stands, grabbing her purse. “Three minutes. Wait for me in my office.”
Kara makes a sound of agreement. The brunette ends the call as she hops into the elevator, and she spends the ride up her office trying to push away the guilt, the images of blood in her hands. It’s her chance to make amends, perhaps; a chance to deserve to be Kara Danvers’ best friend again, or at the very least, her friend.
It would mean the world.
She clenches her fists around her purse as she walks to her office, telling Jess she could go home. Hesitating by the door, Lena takes a shaky breath before putting a smile on her face and stepping into the room.
She doesn’t remember how long she hasn’t seen Kara, but the blonde still looks tired, ocean eyes grayed with the storm clouds. She was about to greet her but the reporter frowns as she takes in Lena’s appearance.
“What- Are you okay?” Kara asks, voice laced with concern. The CEO looks confused and she glances at what she was wearing. Granted, this wasn’t her usual power suit, but the flats she wore were more comfortable when she was standing and walking around, and the shirt and slacks she had on were at least presentable. Flawless, still, and crisp white, as if she is compensating for the darkness in her.
“I’m fine,” she answers, but Kara steps forward, lifting her chin with her hand. Lena realizes what she means and she lets out a humorless chuckle. “I’m fine,” she repeats, though with Kara intently studying her, she feels her heart race, and she clenches her hands around her purse once more as she imagines blood, yet again, trickling down her fingertips.
Kara steps back as apologizes before pushing her glasses up her nose. She looks at Lena, who stands shorter now with her flats. “You haven’t been sleeping,” she says softly, and Lena just shrugs.
“So many things to do, Miss Danvers, yet so little time,” she replies with a smile that she hopes doesn’t look as it feels—forced. “Supergirl doesn’t seem to be taking breaks, why should I?”
“She has super powers,” Kara says quickly, and Lena looks down at her feet.
“But I started all of this,” she says with another shrug. “I’d be able to sleep when I’ve...fixed things.” She grits her teeth as she stares at her hands—clean, clean hands marred with the loss of Kara’s beloved Mon-El. Consequently, Kara from her life, but considering she stands inches away from Lena, she figures one is crossed off her list of sins. She hopes. She is terrified of what else she can take from Kara, accidentally or otherwise, and despite the burning need for contact, for an embrace to anchor her through the storm of guilt and chaos she is going through, she stands still and keeps her distance.
Kara only stares at her, and Lena thinks she sees confusion in those blue depths until she couldn’t take it anymore. She clears her throat and shakes her head.
“I- Right, well, dinner,” Lena says. “Chinese?”
Kara lets out a small laugh, which seems genuine, but a mere echo of how she laughed before.
“Let’s go.”
Dinner was quiet. They had gone to a Chinese restaurant Kara suggested, softly, and Lena insisted it was her treat. They at least talked about the article on Edge that Kara had been working on and had finally published. Lena had remained quiet, for the most part, listening intently about the reporter and her issues with Snapper. Kara had asked why Lena hadn’t visited CatCo again, but the CEO only shrugged and said she was busy with urgent projects. Kara didn’t seem convinced, only stared at the brunette, who fidgeted under her gaze.
“How are you?” Lena finally asks, after a long stretch of silence. She clutches the glass of wine in her right hand as she forces herself not look away at the question. It had been too long since she had heard from her, and despite all her distractions, she had been thinking about her. It was good, great, to finally hear from Kara, and she needed to know.
Kara, at the very least, doesn’t seem surprised by the question. She shrugs.
“Better,” Kara says softly, after some time, as if she had been considering another answer. Lena waits with bated breath on her next words but the blonde was quiet. She opens her mouth so speak but Kara beats her to the punch.
“I know I’ve been...distant,” she starts, and pushes her glasses nervously. She sighs and looks down at her lap. “It’s not just to you. I was distant...to everyone. I- I know that doesn’t make you feel better, but it’s just...easier to shut everyone off while I… Grieve, I suppose.” A humorless chuckle escapes her lips and she forces herself to meet Lena’s gaze. “It’s just- It’s not knowing what happened to him, or what would happen to him, that hurts the most.”
The CEO swallows at the emotions in those blue eyes and she steels herself for the inevitable, her chest constricting as she struggles to breath. Guilt stabs her and hurt blooms in her chest, staining the pristine white blouse she wears.
She could drown in those eyes, and maybe, she should. She deserves to. It was, after all, her fault that Kara had to grieve. Did everyone else blame her too? Kara’s friends must have felt worried and terrible about the blonde shutting them off. Do they know it was all Lena’s fault?
Kara blinks away unshed tears and she bites her lip. “I just… I just want to apologize, Lena,” she says when she speaks again, and it takes all of Lena to not react. Her fists clench on her lap and she stays still, waiting for Kara to continue. “I shouldn’t have done that, but I felt like I needed time to… think things through. To process things. I know I’ve been unfair, and I should have talked to you and told you I needed time instead of just… Disappearing on you. You’re my best friend, and I’m sorry if… I’ve been a terrible one.”
Lena’s jaw twitches with the effort of keeping her features neutral, and not for the first time, she is grateful for the Luthor home she grew up in that she was able to muster this much indifference. She offers Kara a smile and tilts her head. “I understand, Kara,” she says softly. “You don’t have to explain anything. I know you l-love Mon-El and I—” Lena inhales sharply and looks away. Her chest aches once more, mostly with guilt, and she shakes her head as she forces herself to finish her sentence. “I took that away from you by helping Rhea and- and creating that poison that— sent him away.” She stares at her hands, sees blood on them. Mon-El may not be dead. He may be. All the same, the blood on her hands is warm and heavy. She feels the sting of tears in her eyes and shakes her head again as if to pull herself together. “You have nothing to apologize for. If anything—”
“I’m going to stop you right there,” Kara cuts in, and Lena looks up to meet determined blue eyes. “Lena. It wasn’t your fault. Your intentions were pure, and- and it was Rhea who broke your trust, exploited you. Rhea commanded the Daxamites to invade us, not you, and it was—” Kara pauses and grits her teeth, but her voice is softer when she continues. “It was Supergirl’s call, what happened. It was for the best. Please don’t blame yourself, but just know that I forgive you.”
Lena could only stare at Kara. Pure, precious Kara, who still saw the good in everything, in Lena, even after what she had done. She chuckles, her voice raspy with tears. “How can you forgive me, Kara? I took someone you love. I know how loss feels.” She remembers Lex. Lillian. Jack.
“Because none of this is your fault,” Kara insists. “And you’re my friend. My best friend. And I can’t lose you too.” There is that pain again, in her chest, and she wonders if that is still guilt at the weight of Kara’s words. Lena smiles sadly.
Kara. Pure, precious, beautiful Kara.
“I know,” she says, for the first time sure of what she wants. “That’s why I’m going to fix this, Kara.”
They try their best to fall back into old habits. The microbots are released, National City rebuilds itself with L-Corp at the helm. Lena is at the forefront of everything, every press release and launch. CatCo still gets every exclusive courtesy of one Kara Danvers. They grab the occasional brunch, and each time, she sees how Kara's smiles never seemed to reach her eyes anymore. She tries to imagine once more the emptiness she felt after Jack had passed, just to put herself in Kara's shoes, but realizes that she didn't have to, and it is this multiplied feeling of loss—imagined, remembered, and experienced—that pushes her to work.
(She didn’t want to feel. She hated to feel, but at the very best, her grief and guilt fuel her work.
It’s what people would prefer of a Luthor, she assumed. Have them too consumed by grief and work so they don’t have time to plan taking over world.)
She calls Kara one early morning, months later, whiskey on her breath, the smell of chemicals and metal on her hands, the illusion of blood on them. Kara answers with a cheer in her voice, and Lena wonders if she should push through with the call. Her friend had been doing great so far, but Lena knows the feeling of loss is never gone. It remains, a hole in your being that never seems to go away.
Was it just her?
With a thick swallow, she asks if she could drop by Kara's apartment.
Kara agrees, and half an hour later Lena rushes into her home, finding her sister, Alex, present. The CEO pays her no mind and puts two metal boxes on the kitchen table.
"Are you okay, Lena?" Kara asks, worried, and the woman whirls around with panicked eyes. "You still haven't been sleeping," the reporter noted.
"I'll sleep when I fix things," she says softly, and she pushes forward a small metal box, her green eyes dull but fixed on it. "This is a homing device. I know Supergirl sent Mon-El off using her pod, one similar to Superman's. Lex.. He.." She shakes her head. "Point is, I've configured it so similar Kryptonian pods could use it as a sort of lighthouse. To guide them back...here. On Earth." She explains that it's the best she can do with the limited knowledge she had of such technology, and it might send a signal to other Kryptonian pods, but she hopes any that finds their way to National City were friendly aliens—other Kryptonians, perhaps. Specifically, she hopes, Mon-El. For Kara's sake. She doesn't look at Kara but she hears Alex make her way to where they stood. She swallows thickly and pushes forward the smaller metal box.
"This creates a temporary atmosphere at enough radius around an individual. It's rechargeable, but temporary, but enough so we can find some, some sort of vaccine against the toxic reaction for lead." She bites her lip stares hard at the box. "I tried reconfiguring the device we used to fill the atmosphere with lead, but that would require more time and resources and could entail possible repeat of a Daxamite invasion, so I made something of a smaller scale."
Lena lets out a shaky breath. It was quiet, too quiet, and when she looks up, she sees Kara staring at her, tears in her eyes. The brunette shuts her mouth for a moment but forces herself to continue lest she ends up collapsing from fatigue. Or breaks down. She doesn't know what's worse.
"I told you I'd fix it, Kara," she says, proudly, though her voice was soft. Tired.
Kara doesn't say anything, but she looks longingly at the devices Lena had explained. It was Alex who speaks.
"Does this mean Mon-El can come back?"
Lena turns to her. She pushes her hands to her coat pockets and, now hidden, she clenches them into fists. Tired green eyes glance at the blonde. "Mon-El can come back, Kara."
Kara still doesn't speak. Lena feels like she's stepped on a line. Shame drowns the guilt she feels, swirling in her gut, heavy like the burden she felt. All she's done to return National City back to its feet would be for nothing if she can never fix her biggest mistake.
"I- I should probably go," Lena says, almost chokes out, and she hurries out the door. She is already on the hallway when she hears Kara say thank you, and Lena nods, not turning around, and instead leaves.
She is allowed to sleep, finally, but the first time she closes her eyes she drowns in tears of exhaustion and hopelessness. Behind her eyelids she sees Kara smiling and laughing again, with Mon-El—Mike—but it doesn't matter now. She has finally fixed her mistake, and she can sleep again, free her conscience from the greatest mistake she had done.
But why does it feel so much worse?