Chapter Text
Year One
The first time Kara meets Sam Arias is days after the woman and her daughter move to National City. Sam had reached out to her via email asking to meet in person and saying only that it was in regards to the Luthors. Kara had gotten many an email similar to that and only a few had actually been worth her time, but any chance at finding evidence on Lex or Lillian Luthor meant Kara had to try. So she let Alex know what was up and met with Sam at Noonan’s during her lunch break, not wanting to have to report the meeting to Snapper just in case it was sensitive… or baloney (which Alex bet $20 would be the case… again).
So Kara walks into Noonan’s fifteen minutes early planning to buy her usual mountain of food while she waits but instead finds herself making a beeline towards the woman in the back of the small restaurant, her sole cup of coffee untouched as she shreds a napkin above an already-very-large pile of napkin shreds. Kara of course has no clue what Sam Arias looks like but she figures even if this woman isn’t who she’s meeting with she needs some kind of help regardless, and… well, even though Kara has never met her before she seems familiar, but that thought falls away as soon as she has it.
When Kara stops in front of the woman’s table, rubbing her forehead absently, startled brown eyes meet hers and widen with relief. “Kara,” the woman breathes. Then she pauses, frowning. “Uh, Miss Danvers, I mean.”
“That’s me. I take it you’re Miss Arias?” Kara makes sure she shakes the woman’s hand before sitting down, and she allows her hearing to zoom out for a moment and take in her surroundings, wary of any eavesdroppers. Not catching anyone or anything suspicious, Kara allows most of her focus to go back to the woman across from her. Sam is beautiful, warm brown skin and long dark hair and wearing a suit even Cat Grant would approve of. What Kara mostly notices, though, is how fast her heart is beating, how her eyes are scanning the crowded restaurant for anything out of place, the light sheen of perspiration on her brow, and that she’s already reaching for a new napkin to shred.
“Yes, I… I’m sorry I was so vague in my email, but this is… I know you’re a reporter and not a detective…” Sam trails off and her next words are so quiet Kara is glad she has super hearing. “I can’t go to the police because most of them are in the Luthors’ pockets, and you’re one of the few people who ever speaks out against them with… actual evidence.”
“Not that it ever sticks, but I do try,” Kara can’t help but interrupt, scowling.
Sam winces. “The judges and most useful government officials are… also in their pocket. So that doesn’t exactly surprise me.”
“You seem to know a lot about them,” Kara prompts as gently as she can.
“I… used to hold a high-level position at LuthorCorp,” Sam admits, unable to meet Kara’s eyes. “That’s…” She takes a deep breath. “That’s why I need your help. My friends are missing and I know the Luthors took them. I… I think they already killed our… my other friend, Jack Spheer, last year… his business partner was arrested but the footage… it was doctored, I know, and it fooled even experts, but…” She takes a deep breath and meets Kara’s eyes. “I can’t lose anyone else to them. I don’t care about evidence or any of that, I just want my family back.”
Sam’s words seem to surprise even her, and she stiffens before surveying the room again. Kara gets the sense she didn’t mean to reveal just how close she is to the missing people, though if that’s due to her talking to a stranger or revealing it to anyone potentially listening in Kara doesn’t know. Still, that revelation makes Kara’s calm facade crack, because this woman’s family is missing, and Kara rarely finds anyone suspected to have been taken by the Luthors still alive. Sam must see the apprehension on her face because she immediately shakes her head.
“They aren’t dead. They wouldn’t kill them. Not… not immediately anyway. They probably need my… best friend for something, she’s the smartest person I know, but she always refuses to help them with things she knows are, well, nefarious.” Sam rolls her eyes and almost smiles and Kara’s heart aches for this woman and her family. “My other friend, they probably took her for— for insurance, motivation.” She grimaces. “I just… you’re good at uncovering their schemes, and if I’m going to find them I need… something, anything to go on. I haven’t seen either of them in a month, and they’ve never disappeared on me before, not for this long. And my best friend has never,” here Sam meets Kara’s eyes with ferocity, “never missed Ruby’s birthday.” Again Sam seems surprised to have revealed that, but she sighs and looks down. “She especially wouldn’t miss Ruby’s tenth birthday, and that was last week and she’s… she’s just gone.”
“Ruby?”
“My daughter. I had her when I was a teenager and we raised her together even if she won’t admit it,” Sam mutters, and again she stiffens. This time she gives Kara a funny look. “I… should not be telling you all of this, and I don’t really know why I am, so assuming you aren’t secretly working for the Luthors I would appreciate you not telling anyone else.”
“I’m not one of their evil minions, thank you,” Kara drawls, and her hand squeezes the edge of the table enough that she hears it creak in protest. She drops her hand to her lap and gives Sam a small smile. “And I’ve been told I have one of those faces, so.” Sam gives her a dubious look and Kara elects to change the subject. “Where were your friends last seen?”
“Metropolis. We live there, uh, lived there. Ruby and I just moved to this city, we needed to get away from LuthorCorp now that…” Sam doesn’t seem inclined to finish that sentence and Kara has an uneasy feeling in her stomach now.
“There’s a reporter in Metropolis who—“
“Mr. Kent refused to help,” Sam says flatly.
“Ah.” Kara wets her lips. “May I ask why?”
Sam raises her head and stares Kara straight in the eyes, shoulders back and clearly primed for a fight. “My best friend’s name is Lena Luthor.”
Kara blinks at her. “Yeah that would explain it.” When Sam’s eyes blaze with fury Kara holds her hands up in surrender. “Not that I agree with him! Just, uh, it’s kinda personal for Ca— Clark, is all. Not that that excuses it either,” Kara adds in a hurry. And it really doesn’t, not that she can tell Sam that. Yes, Lex used kryptonite on her cousin, and yes he was still pissed he couldn’t prove it. But that didn’t mean he could just write off a missing person because of their last name, especially not when Superman was probably the woman’s best chance. Speaking of… “I kinda hate to ask this,” Kara says, “but have you tried talking to Superman?”
“I managed to talk to him shortly after Mr. Kent and he was equally unhelpful,” Sam says, an odd look in her eyes. Kara wonders idly if her cousin has unwittingly revealed his identity by being so petty, not that she’s going to tell him. It would explain why Sam and Ruby moved to the only other city with a Super. Kara takes a moment to memorize the woman’s heartbeat just in case the Luthors come for her next.
“Lovely,” is all Kara can say to that. “Well, I’ll see what I can find, but… I don’t know how helpful it will be.”
Sam just nods. “I know. I don’t expect much, I just. I need to know if... here,” she interrupts herself, sliding a folded paper to Kara. “This is all I know about their last whereabouts for sure, including the date and time. Lena was in her office and her secretary, Jess Huang, was at home. Just… if you find anything please…”
Kara takes the paper with a nod and promises to do her best. She isn’t sure Sam believes her, but once the woman has swept her shredded napkins into another to throw away and left, shooting one last confused look at Kara before she goes, Kara heads straight back to CatCo, forgoing her own lunch and interrupting Winn’s instead.
After several hours of searching, Winn hacking what he can and Kara flying around to fill in the gaps while avoiding her cousin at all costs, they manage to find that only hours after her last text with Sam, Lena Luthor was herded into a car by her mother, brother, and a blonde woman and from there was last seen boarding one of the Luthors’ private jets just before sunrise.
The only reason the footage of that even exists is that the airport had set up a camera system separate from their security system to keep track of birds that had been spotted nearby. The security cameras had experienced a five-minute ‘malfunction’ at the time, but a bird watching camera had caught a clear image of a dark-haired woman with a pale face looking directly at it. At no point were any suitcases loaded onto the jet, and the burly men flanking them seemed to be more focused on keeping Lena penned in than on watching their surroundings for potential threats.
All Winn can find on Jess Huang is that she received a single text from Lena Luthor, a ladybug emoji, minutes before the footage showing Lena being taken from LuthorCorp, and after that she vanished without a trace— her apartment empty despite no footage of her ever leaving. Men of a similar burly nature to those at the airport had entered her home and exited empty handed only hours after Lena had been taken.
Kara isn’t willing to send any of what they found via email, so sets up another in-person meeting with Sam Arias for the next day. Sam is even more anxious this time, and when Kara slides her a manila folder her hands shake as she opens it.
“This is all I could find, I’m sorry,” Kara says quietly.
Sam doesn’t respond, leafing through the grainy images and skimming the descriptions. When she gets to the photo from the airport, the clearest of them all and the only one that actually shows Lena’s face, she seems to sink on herself. “Oh, Lena…” It’s so quiet Kara knows she wasn’t supposed to hear it, or the heartbreak therein. Sam finally takes in the rest of the photo, narrowing her eyes at the blonde woman, and Kara hears her mutter a quiet, angry, “Eve”. Then Sam gets to the image of the text chain between Lena Luthor and Jess Huang, and her eyes widen. “Fucking hell,” Sam hisses, and Kara startles.
“Does that… mean something?” Kara asks, wondering if Sam will even answer her.
“Bug out,” Sam says quietly, still staring at the paper. “Lena was gathering evidence on Lex and Lillian, she has been for awhile.” Her brow furrows and Kara wonders if she meant to reveal that. “Uh, she knew they may find out so she… put precautions in place. She kept Ruby and I safe by hiding our… friendship, but she knew Jess would be in danger due to her position so… if she knew things were bad she would send her a ladybug and Jess would know to run. Immediately, and without contacting anyone. Even me. It was… another precaution, in case she was already being monitored.”
“So that means Miss Huang is probably safe, at least,” Kara says, hoping to raise Sam’s spirits at least a little.
Sam nods, then tucks the folder away. When she looks up Kara almost flinches at the hard look in her eyes. “Thank you for your help, but please forget any of this ever happened. If Lena sent Jess away then this is… as serious as I was worried it was. That’s the only reason I told you as much as I just did, so you would understand— please do not contact me further or continue to look into this. Goodbye, Miss Danvers.” Sam stands and strides past Kara without looking back, and once again Kara’s heart aches for Sam and her best friend.
Sam is several blocks away when Kara accidentally overhears her make a phone call, and only manages to quit eavesdropping after she hears the beginning of the conversation, which begins with “Olivia, I’m calling in a favor.”
Later, Kara tells Winn to keep an eye out for Lena Luthor but they both know that now that the Luthors have her she’ll be as impossible to find as anyone else they’ve taken, regardless of whether or not they’re more inclined to keep her alive.
When Alex demands her $20 later, expecting Kara to hand it over with a story of meeting with some new conspiracy theorist, Kara gives it to her and simply says she doesn’t want to talk about it.
The next time Kara meets Sam Arias is weeks later, but it isn’t a meeting between ‘Sam and Kara’ but rather between ‘the DEO’s new Director and Supergirl’. Kara doesn’t work for the DEO, not exactly. Her sister does, and they do help her a lot (especially with finding alien tech and old ships), but Supergirl is more of a… contractor. She doesn’t trust the DEO, especially now that J’onn has left for Mars with M’gann and they’ve replaced him with an outsider. How Sam managed to get the position is a mystery to Kara and Alex both (though rumor is President Marsdin was involved… wait, Olivia Marsdin… oh), and the only reason Alex doesn’t quit after being passed over for what should have been her promotion is that she is immediately head over heels for Director Arias.
Sam doesn’t say much to Supergirl, though at one point Kara is certain she’s about to ask her for help looking for Lena, but, likely recalling how Superman had treated her request, Director Arias just gives Supergirl a brusque nod and gets back to work.
It’s only the second week of Sam being the Director and she’s pacing and talking on the phone with someone in the DEO’s command room, Kara on her way out after bringing in a very aggressive alien who had burst into a restaurant during the dinner rush and demanded salt in exchange for letting people live. Kara hears Ruby’s name mentioned and ends up tuning in, and from what she can tell Sam’s babysitter needs to leave a few hours early for some reason or other, and Sam can’t leave work yet.
“I can watch her if you want,” Kara says, before realizing that Sam doesn’t even trust Supergirl enough to tell her about Lena Luthor, much less allow her to babysit her child.
Sam turns to her, clearly frazzled. “How soon can you get there?” She tells Kara the address (which Kara already knew since she’d decided to memorize Ruby’s heartbeat just in case, not that she’s telling Sam that), and once Kara reminds her of her super speed she sighs and goes back to the call. “Alright, my friend is almost there so you can head out now, tell Ruby she has two minutes of alone time max.”
Kara waves off Sam’s thanks and takes off, and on her way to the Director’s house she hears her sister asking Sam where Supergirl is going, and after Sam answers, both her and Alex’s bio signs register surprise, which nearly makes Kara laugh even as she watches the teenager slowly backing out of Sam’s driveway. Sam had apparently been so desperate she hadn’t realized what she agreed to until it was done.
After a moment of deliberation Kara swoops down and lands in the Arias’ backyard, which is thankfully shielded by a tall fence. She knocks on the door and when she hears a squeak of surprise she peers in with her x-ray vision and watches a small child clamber down from a step stool. Ruby approaches the door cautiously and pulls it open just enough to see through, the deadbolt chain still in place. The one eye Kara can see widens when she sees who’s on her back porch.
“Did… my mom send Supergirl to babysit me?” Ruby asks.
“Yep,” Kara says happily, now hearing Sam back at the DEO muttering to herself to pay better attention and quit trusting random blonde women. “So can I come in or did you wanna go back to snooping in your mom’s office first?”
Ruby’s eye narrows. “Okay so you may have x-ray vision,” she says. “But can you prove you’re Supergirl?”
Kara shakes her head and uses a burst of super speed to grab a baseball-sized rock from the other side of the yard. When she’s on the porch again, she crushes the rock to dust, which she catches with her other hand, and after turning long enough to blast it with heat vision, she turns back, idly molding the new rock into a cat shape before cooling it with her freeze breath. She holds it out with a small grin.
The eye Kara can see narrows again and Ruby slams the door closed, but Kara hears the deadbolt being undone and it opens fully. The girl takes the cat figurine, her hand brushing against Kara’s as she does, and slips it into her pocket, then looks Kara up and down, which usually Kara finds annoying, but having a very tiny, very recently-turned-ten child do it is, Kara is now learning, adorable. Ruby has the same long brown hair and warm skin tone as her mom, and she even manages to mimic her unimpressed look when she meets Kara’s eyes again. “Fine, but I don’t need babysitting.”
She turns and Kara follows her into the house, tying her hair back in a ponytail as she goes. Kara does her best not to laugh at the girl’s posturing, but she does end up snickering when Ruby hurries back into Sam’s office and grabs the foot stool before carefully closing the door and toting it back to the kitchen.
“You didn’t see anything,” Ruby says, turning to glare at Kara as she slides the stool into a cabinet. “Just cuz you can look into people’s houses doesn’t mean you should, ya know.”
Kara holds both hands up in surrender. “I have no clue what you mean,” she says easily, grinning at the frown the girl gives her. “Supergirl would never peek into someone’s private residence, just as you of course would never snoop in your mom’s office.”
Ruby hums and looks her up and down again. “If Mom sent you here, she was in a hurry, so she probably hasn’t told you how much ice cream I’m allowed to have…”
“Most kids would be demanding to be flown around by now,” Kara muses, recalling the times she’d babysat Cat’s son, “but all you want is ice cream?”
Ruby turns and rummages through a drawer. “We can do that after, just in case she thinks to call you to tell you all the rules.” She pulls two spoons out and turns to Kara with a grin. “Now, I watched all your interviews when Mom said we were gonna move here, and we both have the same favorite flavor, so please get some bowls out of that cupboard, Supergirl.”
Kara, now wearing a matching grin, obliges, and after two monstrous bowls of ice cream she does indeed float Ruby around the house, only pausing when the call the girl had predicted comes, Sam rattling off a slew of babysitting rules, none of which include not flying her child around, much to both Kara and Ruby’s amusement.
‘Supergirl’ ends up babysitting Ruby at least a few times a month after that, usually at Sam’s house but sometimes at the DEO, going to get the girl and flying her in when there’s a particularly tricky villain around that Sam is too busy hunting to leave work on time. Kara keeps the child company until it’s time for her to go handle the villain, and after that Alex usually takes over, at some point having decided that babysitting the very stubborn child is much more fun than ordering Kara around via her comm (which is probably good, since Sam has also taken to doing that and Kara can only handle one backseat driver at a time, thank you). If it’s a case where Alex wants to be in the field as well, Ruby is all too happy to hang out with Sam in the command room, and despite everyone knowing to keep her away from the technology Kara inevitably ends up with more than one Arias ‘giving advice’ in her ear mid-battle.
Meanwhile, Alex’s crush on Sam grows and grows— and hanging out with Ruby only makes her like the whole family even more— until she finally talks to her about it a few months into working together. She doesn’t tell Kara the specifics, but she does spend the weekend at Kara’s apartment, eating ice cream and trying not to cry.
“She said she likes me too but she can’t right now,” is all Alex will say.
Kara wonders if it’s because of Sam’s search for Lena Luthor but isn’t sure it’s her place to say anything so she doesn’t, and focuses on comforting her sister instead.
As for Lex and Lillian Luthor, they’re still constantly in the public eye, and despite the world’s growing suspicion of them no one has found any evidence of their more heinous deeds, and what little is found on more benign things is easily swept under the rug.
Sam does manage to find a few places they all know are connected to the Luthors— Kara busts in to hidden labs in warehouses and nondescript buildings every few months, freeing alien hostages and arresting unscrupulous scientists, but there’s never anything there to tie them to anyone, and Lena Luthor is never there either. Kara is pretty sure Sam nearly punches something each time they come up empty handed, but then she huffs and gets back to work.
Year Two
About a year after Sam and Kara’s initial meeting Sam and Alex start dating. Even as she celebrates with her sister Kara wonders if this means Sam has given up on ever finding Lena Luthor. It isn’t a fair thought, she knows. Kara of all people understands that you have to continue living your life eventually, regardless of what else is happening.
When Alex introduces her sister to Sam a few weeks later, the woman’s face betrays nothing, and she doesn’t say a word to Kara about their having met before. Knowing Sam, she probably already looked into Alex’s sister and realized who she was, though why she doesn’t say anything Kara doesn’t know. She hasn’t heard her mention Lena Luthor at all since their first two meetings.
At some point Alex makes the very poor decision to have her sister go babysit Ruby as Kara and not Supergirl, and Kara knows she’s doomed when Ruby lets her in the front door with nary a question. Kara idly cards a hand through Ruby’s hair as she passes her, just as the child’s phone dings with a text, and Kara winces when she glances at it and sees that it’s the one telling her Alex had just called Kara and she would be there soon… her sister really should have texted Ruby and then called Kara at least. She gives Ruby what she thinks is an excellent excuse for how fast she arrived but the girl just smirks.
“So,” Ruby says, already getting the ice cream out of the freezer. “Do you need me to tell you where the bowls are again, or…?”
Kara sighs and gets the bowls and spoons ready. “Don’t tell Alex or she’ll try to make you sign an NDA.”
“I’m barely eleven,” Ruby says, scoffing and already filling her bowl with far too much ice cream. “And I think you’ll get into more trouble than me. Plus, the birthday gift you got me was… kinda sad.”
Kara gasps, offended, and starts overfilling her own bowl. “I made that myself!”
Ruby pauses, frowning at her around a bite of ice cream. “It’s a doll house. It is made of… some kind of wood and metal, so it’s kinda fancy, I guess, but…”
Kara frowns then. “I maybe should have shown you how to use it. Come with me.” She takes her bowl and leads the way to the large doll house sitting in the living room. Once Ruby, now very confused, is beside her, Kara reaches down and rings the doorbell.
There’s a flash of red light and then Kara has to use her super speed to catch Ruby’s bowl of ice cream when the child drops it, because instead of standing outside of the doll house they’re both in it, and doll-sized at that.
“Fucking hell,” Ruby whispers.
“Language,” Kara says, frowning and sitting the bowl on the entryway table.
“I get to say that once a month,” Ruby says absently, spinning slowly and taking everything in. “Super— uh, Kara, does this mean you gave me a whole house?”
“I thought you would have fun with the pool at least. If you do this,” Kara flips a switch and the lights come on, and they both hear the pool a few rooms away filling with water. “And there’re plenty of safety measures in place,” Kara adds, waving her hand vaguely. “It won’t let you drown, and no one can grab us or anything even though we’re tiny. All you have to do to exit is walk through the front door or say you want to.”
Ruby is still wandering around and gaping at everything, but now Kara is thinking about how she really doesn’t know what kids like, so this gift may still be lacking. As Kara continues following the child and eating her ice cream, she tries to think of gifts she’d gotten when she was Ruby’s age, and… she really doesn’t have the parts to make those.
“Oh,” Kara says, coming to a stop and watching as Ruby does a cannonball fully clothed into the pool. The girl surfaces and swims over to her, placing her arms on the tile ringing the pool and tilting her head expectantly. “I know you like to deal in bribes, so considering that and you finding this gift subpar,” she continues, barely noticing when Ruby opens her mouth, “and that I don’t have the parts to make the kinds of things I got at your age, well!” Kara crouches with a grin. “We can just do what my Aunt Astra and I did!”
Ruby slowly closes her mouth, a considering look in her eyes. “And what did you two do?”
“What time is your mom getting home again?” Kara asks. When Ruby tells her they have a few hours still, Kara’s grin widens, and she pulls the girl out of the pool, ignoring the child’s surprise when she instantly dries, clothes and all. She doesn’t set Ruby down til she reaches the house’s front door, and she idly stores her empty ice cream bowl and Ruby’s melting one in her glasses— the side with the pocket dimension she usually uses for shopping, not her super suit. “I need to grab something, but I’ll be back in a minute,” Kara says once they’ve both exited the house.
It’s thirty minutes later that Kara finally gives Ruby her still only slightly melted ice cream, and the girl takes it automatically, her eyes never leaving the window.
“I think I’m gonna start calling you Auntie Kara,” Ruby mumbles, eating her ice cream now.
“That’s fine, but why?” Kara asks, pressing a few of the buttons on the control panel in front of her and scowling when she realizes just how many parts she’s going to need to manage to go any farther out.
“Well you gave me a whole house, and now… we’re in space,” Ruby says, her gaze now fixed on the curve of the Earth below them. “And there’s no way I’m telling Mom any of this, and I was told once that I should only keep secrets from my family if it’s… for my family’s safety.”
Kara looks up finally, frowning. “Why would not telling Sam be keeping me safe?”
Ruby finally looks away from the window, though her eyes slip off of Kara quickly when she spots the moon out the other window, much closer to them now than Earth is. “If Mom finds out you took me to space she may actually kill you, Aunt Kara.”
“Aunt Astra took me to whole other planets all the time,” Kara says, pouting now. “And my parents… hm, they didn’t know, actually. I liked having something secret only we knew about, and I didn’t want them to be mad at her since I almost got eaten… a lot…”
The rest of the trip passes quickly, Ruby still staring out the windows and Kara regaling her with her trips to other planets with her aunt, which for some reason occasionally causes Ruby to look at her with very startled expressions. When they land and Kara gets Ruby back home just as Sam is unlocking the door (after a heavy makeout session with Alex, which Kara did not appreciate hearing on the flight over even if this is their date night and it gave her enough time to get back without getting caught), Ruby whispers that she wants to go on a secret flight for her next birthday too, and Kara agrees, still wondering why the girl thinks Sam would be mad in the first place.
Months later when Alex and Kara reveal Kara’s Super secret to Sam, Kara watches a spark of hope flare to life in Sam’s eyes and then instantly die. It takes her a moment to wonder why before she realizes: yes, Supergirl who trusts Sam with her secret would help her search for Lena… but she already did and wasn’t particularly helpful. Kara winces and shakes her head and Sam blows out a breath and doesn’t say a word about it, simply telling Kara to not let Ruby know she’s Supergirl for now, to which Kara gives a simple nod.
Secretly, Kara is glad that Sam hasn’t given up on her missing family member yet, even if Kara herself doesn’t know that anything will help at this point. The Luthors have become especially slippery lately, even with Lex having two broken arms somehow, and Kara hasn’t found a bit of evidence on them for even petty crimes in months. Anytime she’s called to a scene they should be at, that there is literally no escape from, no one is there, and Supergirl leaves empty handed yet again.
Sam continues finding places with hostages and what Alex dubs ‘evil scientists, and not the fun kind’, though when Kara asks her how she’s doing it she just shrugs and says the DEO got some ‘anonymous tips’.
It’s about a month later that Sam calls Kara and Alex into her office, and even as Kara taps Alex’s shoulder and brushes against Sam’s arm, ignoring her sister’s look, she idly wonders if Sam found out about her taking Ruby to space, or the specifics of the doll house since Ruby told her that needs to stay secret as well.
“So, good news,” Sam says, and Kara relaxes slightly. She places a photo on the desk, a familiar face scowling at the camera.
Alex scoffs. “That bitch tried to kill my sister, the only good news would be if she’s dead.” She looks at Kara then, as if reassuring herself she’s still alive and well, and Kara resists the urge to roll her eyes.
Yes, the person in the photo had attacked her with… essentially a gas bomb made with kryptonite, and yes, Kara had been unconscious in the sun bed for a few days, but she was fine, and there had been no other casualties so Kara doesn’t really care much.
“Like I said,” Sam drawls, “good news.”
Alex’s head whips back and she stares at her girlfriend in surprise. Then she pales. “It wasn’t me, I promise.”
Sam shakes her head. “I know, babe— it happened last night and you were with me at the time,” she drawls, and Alex’s face turns red. Kara turns to leave. “No, Supergirl, wait, there’s more.”
Kara turns, nose wrinkled. “I don’t know that I want to hear any more, thank you.” She has accidentally heard far too much thanks to her super hearing already.
Alex looks away and Sam sighs. “Her death is being investigated as an assassination, because who, or… whatever, did it, broke into the prison.” When Alex looks at her, mouth agape, Sam places another photo on the table: bars that look like they’d been bent and quickly straightened, and a black blur at the edge of the photo, likely the perpetrator, though they were moving far too fast for the camera to get a clear image.
“Interesting,” Alex mutters, scrutinizing the photo. “Anything else to go on?”
Sam scowls, crossing her arms. “No. No one saw anything, no one heard anything, and all we know about their powers are that they’re fast and strong.”
“And they knew where their target was somehow,” Kara adds. She shrugs when they look at her. “It’s a big prison, maximum security, and they got in and out without arousing suspicion. They do good reconnaissance work.”
Her sister hums an agreement and goes back to staring at the photo, and Kara leaves after Sam waves her off.
It’s awhile later that Kara finds a spaceship with three people in stasis, and when they’re all awake she learns, to her slight annoyance since it means she can’t salvage it for parts, that the ship is mostly functional and from the future of all things, which she finds incredibly odd since its parts are very similar to what a Kryptonian ship would have.
Kara is watching all three of them, brow crinkled and debating how best to initiate physical contact, when the one whose name she didn’t get steps forward, a sad kind of smile on their face, and holds out a hand for her to shake. She does so, and once the other two have followed suit Kara finally relaxes.
One young man, who is very insistent that everyone call him ‘Brainy’, asks her to help him fix their ship, and seems oddly confident she’ll be able to despite Supergirl not being known for her mechanic skills. Once she’s assessed the problem with their engine she hovers, head tilted as her brain speeds ahead to decide the best way to fix it with the parts she currently has, and when she settles down a second later she can see the question on his face.
“It’s easier to think if I don’t have to regulate my strength,” Kara mutters, flushing. He seems even more confused and she tells him she’ll be back in a few minutes before leaving to get the parts she needs.
The group is from some kind of planetary defense force Earth will create at a date they won’t specify, ‘Legion’ or something like that, and all of them have been watching Kara oddly the whole time, though since she’s mostly near Brainy while they fix the ship, he’s the worst of all.
“What?” Kara finally asks, turning to him once the engine is repaired.
Brainy’s eyes widen. “Nothing…” He almost says something and clamps his mouth closed. “Uh… Supergirl,” he finishes, lips flattened in a tight line.
Kara narrows her eyes. “I already know you all know my name, I heard Imra say it earlier. You can just call me Kara.”
“I really cannot,” Brainy mutters, and flushes suddenly. “Anyway, thank you very much for helping me fix our ship, and I apologize for needing you to supply some of the parts, but I believe—“ His ring makes a small sound and vibrates on his finger, and he frowns down at it. Brainy taps it and the ring projects some kind of document, Kara thinks, though the tech has something similar to what Krypton did, because she can’t make out what it actually says since the words are a blur to her.
Brainy pales as he reads, and once he’s done he taps the ring and the projection disappears. He stands and stiffly walks out, and it’s only once he’s gathered everyone in a small conference room at the DEO, Kara physically brushing past them all on her way to the back of the room, that he speaks again.
“The ship has been repaired, but while you all must leave, I will be remaining here,” Brainy says evenly, and when Imra steps forward, face stormy, he holds up the hand with the ring on it and gestures to it. “My…” His eyes dart to Kara again and then fix on Imra. “Legion’s commanders left me a… note. There are… records of my presence starting at this date, and so here I must remain.”
Imra comes closer, arms crossed. “Do you really think that’s a good idea, considering?” She nods to Kara and Brainy stiffens further.
“I am sure…” He opens and closes his mouth, and much to Kara’s shock he mutters a Kryptonian curse before flushing again. He turns to her and meets her eyes. “I am sure… Kara…” He grimaces. “Will be most accommodating.”
Alex steps forward then, arms crossed much like Imra’s are, though when Imra looks over and notices that she drops her own arms to her sides. “Is there a reason you can barely say my sister’s name?”
Brainy gulps and his hands twitch slightly. “I… have heard quite a lot about this time period… Supergirl especially, so I simply… need a bit to adjust to… meeting her in-person, is all.” He gives a Kara look then that’s half glare and half pout before forcing his face into a neutral expression.
The androgynous person whose name Kara didn’t catch, with wild, curly hair and an odd smirk steps forward then, placing one hand on Imra’s shoulder and watching Brainy intently. “And was that all the ‘note’ said, Brainy?”
Brainy and Imra both glare at them and they look away, shoulders shaking with laughter. “Fucking hell, you!” Imra mutters a Kryptonian curse then and Kara’s eyes widen, but Imra ignores her, still intent on the person beside her. “You already knew,” she hisses. “Why the fuck didn’t you warn us?”
The person turns back, still a little too smirky for Kara’s liking, and… there’s something familiar about them, but… she starts rubbing her forehead idly as a dull throb starts in her mind, and the curly-haired person notices the movement, their humor vanishing. “I didn’t know for sure,” they mutter, stepping back and scuffing one foot on the floor. “I just… it was around this time, I thought.”
Imra is comforting them now, wrapping one arm around their shoulders and pressing a kiss to their cheek, but Kara, brow crinkled, has her focus drawn back to Brainy when he clears his throat, and her curiosity about the curly-haired person falls away along with the pounding in her head.
“The note also mentioned that Winn Schott Jr. will be taking my place aboard the ship,” Brainy says stiffly.
“I get to what?” Winn yelps. “I— but it’s the future! Why am I going to the future?” He’s already bouncing up and down with excitement.
“The note said there is no record of you after today’s date,” Brainy says calmly, “and that, according to a document from an old DEO server, you departed to the future on a ship which perfectly matches our own.”
Kara smiles when Winn turns to her, hands flapping and radiating joy, even as she feels a sort of emptiness within herself, because Winn is leaving, and to a place she has no way of following. He’s been her best friend for years now, and… she… can’t ask him to stay, not with an opportunity like this, and not when the only reason it’s happening is that it already happened, in a way… She sees, then, Brainy watching her again, and there is a sort of grief in his eyes she doesn’t understand, though if it’s for his having to stay or Winn’s having to go, she doesn’t know.
So Winn leaves that day, along with Imra and the person whose name Kara never learned, and Brainy stays, and the DEO has a new tech guy who is valiantly trying to call Kara by her name but mostly resorting to calling her Supergirl, and at one point Kara overhears Sam asking Brainy about Lena Luthor, but Brainy simply says he’s never heard of her, and that no records of anyone with that name exist in the future, and Sam mutters a curse and stomps away.
It’s only a week later and Kara is doing a morning patrol before work when a young girl on a rooftop waves her down. A dull throbbing starts at the base of Kara’s skull when she lands nearby and the girl immediately muffles a cough. “Supergirl,” she says, smiling at Kara even as her eyes start to water. Kara wants to be anywhere else for some reason, and starts to lift off but the girl lunges forward and latches onto her cape. “Please, I just wanted—“ She coughs, shoulders shaking. “They’re going to kill your sister,” the girl manages finally. “They won’t let you save her, and, um, it’s okay to break the rules as long as it’s for your family… remember what the Captain, uh, your aunt Astra said, you have to fight for your family no matter what.” She hugs Kara then, and pulls away, wincing and rubbing at the rash blooming on her skin. “I would help you if I could, but that’s all I know, there… was a note that said to say all that…“ She sneezes this time and Kara finally gets out of reach.
The girl is still watching her, though Kara refuses to even look at her, rubbing her forehead as the pain in her mind worsens. Then she hears a sound that makes her freeze, and a moment later her own voice is being broadcast at a level only she can hear, and speaking in ancient Kryptonian no less: “We have to save Alex, come now.”
Kara mutes her comm and turns off her tracker, heart already pounding, and zooms off, her memory of the girl already falling away. She follows the soft pinging sound to find her ship hovering thousands of feet above National City, invisible and untraceable aside from the sound it’s emitting. The door opens and she flies in to find herself already standing at one end of the wishbone-shaped device she cobbled together along with her ship shortly after she landed on Earth, determined to never be at the mercy of time again and for some reason not fearing the time wraiths…
Even as the dull throb in her head at that thought fades, Kara meets her future self’s red-rimmed eyes and sees her anguish, the tears still slipping down her cheeks, the way her breaths come fast and uneven and how her fists are clenched so tightly Kara can hear her bones creaking in protest, and she’s pretty sure some of them have already cracked.
Kara goes to the other end of the device and places her hand on it, squeezing her eyes shut and dreading whatever she’s about to experience, and when her future self touches it as well—
Alex is missing, and Kara can’t find her. Nia can’t dream her location, Brainy is confused he’d never heard of this happening, and Sam and Kara are both turning National City upside down to no avail.
Sam actually does punch a wall when they find another dead end, a place Alex should have been, that everything pointed to her being, and no one is there, though Kara idly thinks it’s awfully foggy for afternoon. The thought is gone a moment later when Sam rattles off a new location in her comm, and the cycle repeats.
They don’t find her until the next day, and her sister is… she’s…
Alex is dead.
Sam collapses, clutching her head and screaming in a way that hurts Kara’s, and Kara… Kara remembers, suddenly, how often her aunt told her to fight for her family, and even though she knows she shouldn’t break the rules, it has to be okay for this, for her sister.
She flies to her apartment so quickly she can vaguely hear all the glass in her path shattering, can hear the sonic boom she makes, but it doesn’t matter because none of this is going to matter.
Kara bursts through the wall into her apartment and grabs the rock on her coffee table shaped like a cartoon spaceship, and she takes it with her up, up, up above the city, and when she’s high enough that no one will notice she activates it, red lines coursing through it as it grows and grows, and even the minute it takes to finish expanding is too long, and Kara can feel her chest burning and she’s sobbing and struggling not to punch something with her full strength, but that is destruction she cannot risk, not ever, and—
It’s going to be okay, and she scrubs at her cheeks and flies into her ship and goes back to yesterday.
She calls for her past self, tells her what’s happening in a language only they should know, and even the few minutes it takes her to arrive are excruciating, and controlling her strength has never been so difficult. Kara can feel the smaller bones in her hands cracking with how tight she’s fisted them but it doesn’t matter, because soon she’ll be gone, and Alex will never have died, and her past self will save their sister.
Past Kara walks in and takes one look at her before placing her hand on the device shaped like a wishbone and—
Kara blinks back into herself, tears slipping down her cheeks at the memories and she stares down at her hands, flexing them and struggling to understand why there’s no pain, no broken bones… right, that version of herself is gone, that whole time line, that whole possibility was erased as soon as she came back here and merged the souls of her past and future selves…
But if Kara doesn’t act soon it may happen again, and she shoots out of her ship, comm still muted and tracker still deactivated, and sends a quick text to Cat that she doesn’t know what time she’ll make it to work today, if she does at all. She orders the ship to return home and merge with its past self before zooming off towards the sound of Alex’s heartbeat.
Kara stalks her sister from above, doesn’t let her out of her sight, yet again Alex goes missing, white fog in her wake that makes Kara’s head hurt, but this time Kara already knows all the places she should be.
Kara ignores the comm in her ear crackling with Sam and Brainy and Nia’s panic when they realize Alex is gone, and she flies to the final location they’d checked, where her sister’s body had been floating—
She pushes the thought away, forces her tears to subside when there’s no one there, and starts backtracking, checking every spot they’d tried before. In the third to last spot she has left to search, Sam now yelling into her comm for Supergirl to fucking answer her already, she finally sees Alex, in a tank slowly filling with water and cussing out someone they had grown up with in Midvale.
Kara lands in the center of the building so heavily the tank her sister is in shatters, water flooding out, and Alex immediately knocks the man unconscious, and a moment later Kara is hugging her and they’re surrounded by white fog… and time wraiths.
Alex stiffens but Kara hugs her closer and glares at the wraiths, and a tall one, the tallest she’s ever seen, appears, and there’s a painful pounding in her head now that feels twofold somehow, but the tall wraith glares at the others, all covering their faces and shaking with coughs, until they all leave, and then it glares at Kara before vanishing as well.
“Kara—“ Alex starts.
“No,” Kara growls. “You’re alive, and they’re gone, and it’s fine.” Even though she said it, she no longer knows who ‘they’ was referring to, but it doesn’t matter, because her sister is alive and everything is okay again.
Her sister sucks in a breath. “Did I… die?” Her voice is quiet, pained, and it makes Kara’s chest hurt.
Kara pulls away enough to glare at her. “You’re alive now, so no.”
Alex takes a shuddering breath before hugging her again. “Thank you,” she finally whispers. Then, “Don’t tell Sam, she… there’s too much going on already.”
Kara hugs her as tightly as she dares, and idly wonders why no wraiths showed up like they did when Barry Allen messed with time, but the thought falls away. She pulls back and gives Alex a cheeky grin. “In that case you had better call her because she’s been cussing me out for the last ten minutes.”
“God dammit— Kara!” Alex ends up stealing her phone and calling Sam, and she gets cussed out for a solid thirty seconds before Sam pauses long enough to realize who’s on the other end.