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Kara gazes out into the room when she steps onto the circular stage in that large theatre auditorium and receives her Pulitzer Prize for Journalism. It was awarded to her for advocacy of positive societal change in print journalism. In her article that won her the award, she encouraged the inhabitants of the United States, specifically, and others around the world as well to not hate those they don’t know nor understand, but to form both workable and meaningful relationships amongst themselves, aliens and humans alike, to effectively co-exist amidst Lex Luthor’s attempted tyrannical xenophobia fueled societal and possibly planned world takeover.
She searches for, but can’t find the one person she’s looking for to sincerely thank the most. She misses the woman who gave her the unexpected chance and incredible opportunity to become a reporter in the first place. She wishes to see the bright lady who always gave her the courage to be brave and to be herself and true to helping others in so many difficult circumstances as both Supergirl and more significantly as only Kara.
She doesn’t expect to see Cat here tonight because she knows Cat took an indefinite trip away with Carter and Olivia at Kara’s insistence to Argo City soon after everything went to heck in a hand basket with Olivia being outed as an alien and the Children of Liberty rising up against her and all the other aliens peaceably seeking refuge on Earth.
Before she left, Cat confided in Kara that this plot against Olivia had all the hallmarks of being a master scheme of Lex Luthor long before he ever stepped forward to make it known he indeed was the devil guiding society down an alien eliminating road. That suspicion made Kara worried about Cat.
Kara missed Cat a lot, but was grateful Cat left because as everything unfolded with Lex being revealed as the mastermind behind it all as Cat rightly had suspected, Kara knew Cat might have been physically and emotionally injured again. She wouldn’t have wanted anyone else close to her to have been hurt in the crosshairs of the Super-Luthor feud; and, especially not Cat, who had Carter to care for.
It was kept out of the press back then, but Kara knows Lex hurt not only Lena, and James, but Lois and Cat as well during his tirade against Superman (Clark/Kal-El) in Metropolis years ago. She’s glad Cat was safely away this time from that madman and his reprehensible goon who usurped Olivia’s Presidential office. She’s glad Cat didn’t stay put under Baker’s regime and didn’t try to take him down from within the cogs of Lex’s machinations as a spy in disguise for Supergirl’s side.
Both Olivia and Cat received hundreds of death threats in the wake of the world learning Olivia was an alien. Cat was seen as an all-around alien sympathizer for both her connection to Supergirl and her directly working with Olivia as her press secretary. They hid out in the small village of Bhutan for awhile where Cat had retreated to years before when she first left CatCo, but didn’t wish to endanger anyone there as after a few peaceful months Red Daughter found them there. The faux Kara tried to nab Cat, but Olivia warded her off and got them back stateside to confer with Kara.
It became the best plan for the ladies and Carter to lay low somewhere safer off world, indefinitely. Kara asked Alura to take in her friends and her mother agreed. Olivia, Cat and Carter actually left for Argo with Lois and Superman after all the Elseworlds craziness.
There’s a sea of flashing bright lights and overwhelming clapping as Kara both stands up to receive her award and after her speech that keeps her from immediately seeing Cat or hearing her familiar heartbeat thrumming away rapidly as she is excited for Kara.
When Kara steps down from the stage and proudly strides through the room and lifts her award high with a triumphant smile that graces her face, many people shake her free hand and congratulate her. Halfway back to her row in the large auditorium, Kara stands stock still for a brief moment as she recognizes Cat’s heartbeat present in the crowded room. She continually scans the entire space and just can’t see her.
As she gets closer to her family and friends, she watches as Alex smiles as she whispers to someone who now sits in Kara’s seat with an old fashioned camera with a flashbulb flash piece held up over their face. Kara gasps after the camera holder snaps a few close-up photos of her holding her prize and then lowers the camera. Her heart speeds up as she sees the woman she so desperately wanted to personally offer her overwhelming gratitude to tonight.
“Hello, Kara. Surprise! I’m so very proud of you!”
“Oh my Rao! Miss Grant-Cat-I-I can’t believe you are here!”
Cat gingerly hands James who sits on her other side his camera back as she quickly stands up and manages to catch Kara’s Pulitzer as it slips out of her hand as she’s overly elated to see and super eager to hug Cat in close a warm embrace.
Kara laughs and whispers into Cat’s left ear as they hug as Cat clutches Kara’s Pulitzer behind the younger woman’s back, “Shoot-oops, thank you!”
“Great thing I do have feline like reflexes, Kara, darling, but you need to be more careful with something this precious, especially since this is your very first one.”
“You’re far more precious to me than any award could ever be, Cat! I’m so happy you are safe and that you were able to make it here tonight! You didn’t have to come, but I’m so happy that you have because you need to know I never could have made it here to receive such a prestigious honor without all of your care and support.”
“Even though I chose to step away from you through all of this past year?”
“Yes, Cat! Of course! You made the best decision to protect Carter and yourself. Still, please don’t go so far away from me ever again even if I suggest it.”
Cat looks into Kara’s eyes that start to stream tears of happiness and assures her, “I plan to stay. I’m back for good! I don’t think my fragile heart could bear it if I had to say goodbye to you without knowing when I would see you again.”
”You’re right. I can’t let us part like that again not without you knowing how I truly feel about you.”
“And, how is that?”
Kara moves to kiss Cat and Cat leans in expectantly. When their lips gently meet for the first time the row of Kara’s family and friends all excitedly clap and whistle for them. As things get a little more heated, Cat pulls back and informs Kara they have a bigger audience than just her family and friends.
She suggests, “Kara, I think we should take this outside and maybe back to my place or yours.”
As they walk out the back hallway of the auditorium hand in hand, Kara tells her, “We need to stop at my place first as Eliza wants me to celebrate with everybody, but after everyone leaves we can go back to yours for a more private celebration if you’d like.”
Cat brightly smiles as she agrees, “Sounds like a very reasonable plan of action as long as I can get someone to watch Carter.”
Kara doesn’t want to kiss Cat with the crowd in the auditorium lobby that surround them as they wait for Cat’s driver to pull her car around so Kara asks, “What will you do for work now?”
Cat half jokes, ”Well, while out there on Argo I did manage to fill up several journals on my unwavering devotion and love for aliens and discoveries about alien worlds so while I could publish and go on a book tour with all of those first person insights, I received word shortly after returning to our Earth that CatCo was being sold again so I did something.”
”Yes. Uh Lena decided to let it go sort of how she’s decided to let me go from her life for now. But, Cat, what did you do?”
Before she answers, they step into and sit down side by side in Cat’s towncar.
As the driver pulls away from the auditorium entrance, Cat holds up Kara’s left hand in her right to her lips and kisses it, ”Darling, it’s her great loss. Be done with her at least until she pulls her head out of her arse and realizes you never did anything wrong to purposely hurt her once. Anyways, she made the mistake of forgetting 45% of CatCo stock was put in a shared trust for Carter even after she bought the other 55% of my company up partly from my own relinquished trust stocks before. Buying 15% back from this newer woman wasn’t too difficult to finagle. With controlling interest as Carter’s proxy over his company shares until he turns 21, I can get the board to vote in a new CEO.”
”Or the proven to be most successful original one? Do you really want to go backwards in your career at this point, Cat?”
”This will not be a step backwards. This will be a leap forwards. This is a chance to preserve my legacy and get my company I built from the ground up back on track with someone who knows how to make waves in news reporting both in print and online at the helm. It’s not your fault at all, but I can’t believe how miserably CatCo under Jimmy and Lena’s lack of care failed to report so much on both that whole Reign and the Worldkillers debaucle and Lex as the homicidal maniac he is and allowed so much airtime and print space for those fake bastions of Liberty buffoons while failing to put out hard hitting stories about aliens’ rights and Supergirl not being a traitor to this country. You and Nia directed the only good news coverage for CatCo in the last few years. I’m so glad I sent her your way.”
Kara smiles at Cat as she gleefully exclaims, “And, I’m so overjoyed that you’re back! I-I-I love you!”
“I love you too, Kara, so much!”
They start to lock lips hungrily for several frenzied minutes before Cat’s phone buzzes. She pulls back from Kara again to both catch her breath and remove her phone from her purse clutch to take the call only because it’s Carter’s ringtone.
“Car-ter, hi, hon-ey.”
“Mom, is everything okay? You sound a little out of breath. Was Kara happy to see you?”
Kara grabs the phone and speaks to Carter, “Hello, buddy, yes I was and I am, but when can I see you?”
“How about right now?”
Kara laughs as Cat’s driver pulls her towncar over and there’s a light rapping on the window. As Kara rolls the window down, she soon recognizes that they are already at her apartment building as it wasn’t far from where the Pulitzer ceremony was held. Eliza stands behind Carter who is eager to greet Kara.
Kara reaches her arms out to pull Carter halfway into the car through the window before Cat protests, “You can’t do a full body hug through a window!”
Kara laughs as she lets go of Carter. “Your mom’s right, buddy.”
Carter carefully slips out and down from the window and Kara cautiously, but quickly opens the door and pulls Carter into a tight hug.
When the hug breaks Kara tells him,
“Carter, buddy, I think you’ve grown half a foot in a year.”
“Nah, just a quarter!”
“I hear you’re sort of my boss now?”
“Nope, Mom’s always going to be the boss! I think she can do a better job at running her company until I graduate college at least.”
“I think you’re right, buddy, but someday I hope you will be able to take the helm if you want to. If not, maybe I will.”
Cat butts in, “Hey! Hey! I’m not up and retiring and letting anyone else takeover CatCo anytime soon. There’s a lot left to teach you, Kara, as this is just your first Pulitzer. I do have a half dozen more of these than you myself.”
Kara and Carter both loudly chuckle. Carter asks to hold Kara’s award and she lets him. As other cars with Kara’s family and friends pull up, Cat and Kara walk hand in hand into Kara’s apartment building behind Carter and Eliza to celebrate together with all of Kara’s favorite takeout foods and Eliza’s amazing chocolate pecan pie. Before they do eat, Kara and Cat both change from their gala like dresses into comfier clothes of Kara’s.
As it gets late and everyone says their momentary goodbyes and leaves, Eliza taps Kara on the shoulder who’s laid out on the couch with her arms wrapped around Cat who has her arms wrapped around Carter and suggests she can watch Carter if her and Cat want to leave to have alone time.
Kara yawns, “Thanks, but, no, it’s okay. We can all stay together here tonight. I will move them to my bed and come bring you some extra sheets and pillows for the couch so you don’t have to go back to Alex’s so late.”
Kara carries Carter to her bed first and he flops down across the middle. Next she gently lifts Cat and Cat stirs and starts gently nipping at Kara’s neck with soft kisses.
“Oh, Cat! Carter’s here and Eliza is too. I want to be with you, but tonight we should all just rest. Tomorrow we can have a proper first date and maybe a little more.”
Cat nods and she’s out like a turned off light again.
Kara quickly sets up Eliza’s makeshift sleep accommodations on the couch. She smiles when she returns to her bedroom to find Cat flopped down next to Carter taking up most of her small bed’s space. She curls in on the very edge behind Cat.
When Cat stirs in the morning and worries because she doesn’t see Kara, Kara whispers up to her, “Hello, I still love you even though you did kick me onto the floor!”
“Lies! I think you just fell, but Kara get back up here and hold onto me you goof!”
Carter takes that as his cue to announce he’s awake, “Mom, Kara, I’m going to go make pancakes with Eliza, okay?”
Kara tells him, “Sure, buddy! Sounds good. Save us some!”
“I will if you don’t play kissy face games together too long!”
Cat and Kara both giddily laugh. As soon as he runs out though, they do kiss tenderly until Kara stops mid kiss, leaps up and yells, “Food’s ready.”
“Well, Hello! Can’t believe I’m in love with such a food-obsessed overgrown child!”
“That’s rude! I’m now a Pulitzer Prize winning grownup with just a normal appetite for an alien!”
“Touché! Let’s go eat!”
Kara kisses Cat again and smiles as she tells her she loves her again and pulls her into the kitchen to share breakfast with Eliza and Carter. Breakfast with just the two of them and Carter will become an everyday staple for many years to come. Cat’s small pop-in surprise at the Pulitzer Prize Awards leads to them becoming each other’s greatest prize for the rest of their lives together.