Chapter Text
There are a few rules that comes with being an alien on a foreign planet. Control your powers, of course, because they can destroy much faster than they can create. Keep your head down. Blend in. And in exchange, you’ll be safe.
Kara, in the years since coming to Earth, has gotten good at this. She works at an excruciatingly slow pace, just fast enough that Ms. Grant won’t complain. She adds trips and stumbles into her stride, in a carefully choreographed dance that keeps her klutziness looking authentic without breaking a tile. She ignores the cries for help she can hear three blocks away. She spends so much energy being normal, it’s almost enough to keep her from being bored.
And yes, she’s bored. And yes, it hurts every time she doesn’t help someone. But it’s a small price to pay for safety. Even if she were willing to risk her own safety, which she is, Alex and Eliza already lost one person to her carelessness. She wouldn’t let another member of her small family get hurt.
So, when Ms. Grant’s latte gets cold, she uses a microwave. When Ms. Grant piles on work, she stays late to give enough time for a normal person to finish it. Because the deal is that if she hides her powers, everyone stays safe.
Kara Danvers is sitting at her desk outside Ms. Grant’s office, typing at a very human speed, when a wave of lightheadedness washes over her, in a way she hasn’t felt since she left Krypton.
Later, she will find out it was Lex Luthor, in a fit of rage against her cousin. Later, she will watch the news in horror, for days that turned into weeks, as they find out the full extent of the damage.
But for the first few seconds, she feels peace. Quiet. Like sitting down on the couch after a long day at work. It’s bliss.
It’s a few seconds later that she hears the first shouts. They snaps her out of her daze. An unease ripples through the office and she moves toward the balcony with what feels like the entire floor. And that’s when she finally sees what all the fuss is about.
The sun is red. She steps onto the balcony and for a moment, it feels like a miracle. For a second, she lets herself believe it isn’t Earth’s sun in front of her, it’s Rao, in all his glory. Rao, gifting her with quiet for the first time in thirteen years, as her super senses fade away. She takes off her glasses and the buildings keep their skin off. She grips the railing and it stands against her, strong, supportive. A wave of nostalgia washes over her, for the life she could’ve had. She clings to the railing with all her might, like it might ground her as the past blurs with the present, and the bar doesn’t even flinch. For the first time in her life, she’s just like any other human. It’s a relief.
The screams start only a few minutes later.
It seems inevitable, in retrospect. Humans don’t deal with change well. Even without any advanced space travel, they know they’re small on this rock, flying through the universe. Society relies on universal buy-in: an agreement to follow the rules for everyone’s good. In the face of a cosmic event, those rules start to fail. Drivers look at the sun and crash into a building. People start raiding stores, picking fights, looking for excuses to take out their emotions on someone else.
People need help, but she can’t give it to them. Not because she’s supposed to keep a secret, but because that secret’s gone.
That, alone, makes her feel light enough to fly.
“The staff meeting was supposed to start fifteen seconds ago, so unless something on that balcony is offering you a new job, you’d better be in my office by the time I make it to my desk,” Ms. Grant’s voice jolts everyone back to Earth.
The newer CatCo employees stare at Ms. Grant. The veterans simply grumble as they make their way inside.
“Ms. Grant, something’s wrong with the sun.” Kara says, and she knows she sounds like a toddler, but honestly how else is she supposed to explain it?
“Yes, the sun is red, and unless the world stops turning the magazine goes to print tomorrow and if it does stop turning, I need the gazette on that story. Inside. Now.”
The staff meeting is bizarrely normal, and Kara wonders briefly if she’s dreaming. Ms. Grant treats the biggest ecological disaster and global crisis in Earth’s history like a minor Earthquake: an inconvenience to be worked around with a gold mine of stories to be plundered.
Finally, assignments are divided up, pitches have been made, and the meeting begins to wind down.
“There must be something we can do to help,” one of the reporters says, when Ms. Grant starts to dismiss them, and Kara nods furiously. This is why she took the job, after all. If she can’t use her powers in a crisis, she needed to be in a job where she could help some other way.
“We are helping. Is it the red sun crashing cars? Is the change in UV rays making people violent? No. This is happening because people are scared. And when people are scared, they lash out, and they look to us.”
“What about Superman?” Another reporter piped up. “Why isn’t he helping?”
“He loses his powers under the red sun,” Kara mutters, before she can stop herself. Some red-sun-induced wooziness and it seemed ten years of filter crumbled.
“What was that, Kiera?” Ms. Grant asked, and Kara bit back a sigh as she scrambled to remember what was public knowledge.
“Superman gets his powers from the sun, right? Maybe the reason we haven’t seen him anywhere is because the red sun affects his powers.”
“Interesting theory,” Ms. Grant muses. “You! Snapper. Explore that. Everyone else, back to work. We have a crisis on our hands, the people need to know they can rely on us.”
Kara breathes a sigh of relief as the reporters file out of the room.
“Oh, and Kiera?”
Kara freezes.
“Get me another latte.” Ms. Grant says.
“Right now? It’s chaos out there,” Kara protests.
“Yes, and that means more work for us and that’s why I need a latte. Now, chop chop.”
Unsure what else to do, Kara leaves Ms. Grant’s office and head’s toward the elevator.
She’s halfway there when Winn catches up to her.
“Hey, whatcha doing?” He asks, like it’s a normal day and they’re walking to lunch.
“Heading to Noonan’s,” Kara says.
“Right now?”
“Ms. Grant wants another latte.”
“It’s basically a war zone out there.”
“Which is why, according to Ms. Grant, she needs a latte.” Kara presses the call button for the elevator.
“That’s absurd, that is beyond the call of duty, okay. Do you want me to talk to her?”
“I don’t think that would help.”
“It definitely won’t, and she terrifies me, but I will do it if that’s what it takes because you cannot go out there.”
“No, I’ll be fine, I—“ Kara trails off, realizing she doesn’t actually have any reason to believe she’s going to be fine. “I’m resourceful” That has to be true, right?
“I don’t think resourcefulness protects from anarchy.”
“No it’ll be oka—“ Kara trips on the edge of the carpet, and Winn catches her. It’s thrilling, being caught. It makes her feel like a kid again, back when she thought her parents could protect her from anything. It’s a wonderful feeling, to be equal with someone else. To be able to touch them the same way they touch you. Kara fights the corners of her lips that threaten to pull into a smile.
Winn’s looking at her weird when she finally pulls herself back together. Time passes differently without her powers.
“I’m going with you,” he says, and her halfhearted protests fall on deaf ears.
They make it halfway to Noonan’s.
Halfway down the block, the route she spends nearly as much time walking as she does sitting at her desk, with lattes and lunch and dinner and sometimes even alcohol, on the really late nights, even though Noonan’s isn’t supposed to let her carry drinks out.
The red sun is shining overhead, and if she closes her eyes she can almost imagine she’s near the forum in Argo City on Krypton, just a few blocks from their apartment. If she squints and angles her head the right way, she can almost imagine it’s a normal day in National City. The dichotomy is enough to give her a headache.
Even without her superhearing, she can hear the pain around her. The windows on the bottom floor of CatCo are smashed, as are the windows at the convenience store. She can hear gunshots in the distance, and she walks a little bit faster. She walks past a man screaming for his kid, and it takes everything in her not to stop and help him look.
It’s probably a good thing her powers are gone, she realizes. If she could help, she’s not sure she could resist on a day like today.
She hears the squeal of tires on the pavement at the same time as everyone else as a slick sports car flies around the corner a block and a half away.
A little boy, maybe eight years old, halfway through crossing the street, hears it too. He freezes. His eyes wide, his feet bolted to the pavement as he stares down death.
The car shows no sign of slowing as it barrels down the narrow city street.
Winn notices her connect the dots just a second too late. “Kara!” She hears him yell behind her, but she’s already out of reach, racing the car to reach the kid before he’s hit.
Kara’s not used to running as fast as she can. She’s not used to giving all she’s got. By the time she realizes she needs to adapt her effort for the lack of powers, the race is close. Too close.
She reaches the kid, and as she feels her hands (actually feels her hands, she marvels) push against his shoulder, she thinks she might make it.
But she isn’t used to giving it her all, and she’s slowed herself on instinct, to keep her hands from pushing through the kid’s torso instead of pushing him to safety.
The car’s frame hits her squarely in the chest and Kara, for the first time in a very long time, feels pain. It erupts through her rib cage, and triples as her shoulder and skull smack the concrete in quick succession.
The already muffled world spins and darkens around her as she lies in the street.
The car speeds away.