Chapter Text
The truck doesn’t slow when the road narrows.
Alex can see it in the way the driver hugs the curve too tightly, metal rattling under strain, alien tech pulsing wrong through the frame like a heartbeat that doesn’t belong in a human chest.
“DEO units, maintain distance,” J’onn’s voice cuts through the comms. Calm. Commanding. “We don’t know what’s in that vehicle.”
Maggie tightens her grip on the wheel. “Yeah, well, whatever it is, it’s not licensed.”
The truck clips a sedan, sending it spinning into the guardrail. Alex swears under her breath.
“Supergirl’s five out,” a voice reports.
“Copy,” Alex says automatically, eyes tracking the truck. “Let’s keep it boxed.”
And then the sky shifts.
There’s a familiar rush of displaced air, a pressure change that registers more in instinct than sound. Red and blue streak past the windshield, and suddenly the truck is airborne—lifted clean off the asphalt, twisted sideways, slammed down again with bone-rattling force.
The alien doesn’t even get time to scream.
Supergirl lands hard, fist already buried in the truck’s engine block, tearing it free like it’s cardboard instead of reinforced alloy. The fight is over in seconds. Efficient. Brutal. No flourish.
She straightens, scans the wreckage, makes sure no one’s trapped inside.
Then she’s gone.
No wave.
No reassuring smile.
No lingering hover for the cameras already gathering at the edge of the scene.
She disappears into the clouds like she was never there.
Maggie slows the car, blinking once as she takes it all in. “Huh.”
Alex doesn’t answer.
“She doesn’t stop for autographs anymore,” Maggie adds lightly, but there’s a question under it.
Alex watches the empty sky where Kara vanished, jaw tight. “Yeah.”
They don’t say anything else. They don’t need to.
---
The DEO is louder than usual.
Screens flicker with news feeds, analysts talking over each other, agents moving with the restless energy that comes from weeks of near-misses and rising tension. Kara is already there when Alex arrives—changed, suited, focused.
She’s been there most nights.
Training until her muscles scream. Patrols stacked back to back. Briefings she doesn’t technically need to attend, but does anyway.
It’s easier to be useful than it is to be still.
“Kara,” Winn calls from his station. “You’re gonna burn out.”
“I’m fine,” she says, not unkindly, already moving past him.
Alex watches her go. Watches how Kara doesn’t slow, doesn’t joke, doesn’t ask how Maggie’s doing or tease Winn about his caffeine intake. Watches how Supergirl has become less a role and more a default setting.
J’onn joins her quietly. “She’s avoiding something.”
Alex exhales. “She’s avoiding everything.”
---
Across town, Lena Luthor stares at her phone longer than necessary.
She’s been back at L-Corp for hours. Meetings, calls, an acquisition she barely remembers approving. Kara’s desk has called or texted all day.
Again.
Lena types.
LENA: Are you at Catco today?
The reply comes quickly.
Too quickly.
KARA: Tomorrow.
Just that. No emoji. No apology. No explanation.
Lena sets the phone down, fingers tapping against the desk once, twice. Kara Danvers is many things. Curt is not usually one of them.
Something’s wrong.
She doesn’t interrogate that thought. Doesn’t dramatize it. She’s learned not to assume the worst without data.
But concern settles anyway, quiet and persistent.
---
That night, Alex finds Kara in her apartment.
The lights are low. The place looks untouched, like Kara’s only been passing through between shifts.
“Kara,” Alex says, arms crossed, tone careful. “We need to talk.”
Kara doesn’t look up right away.
And somewhere down the hall, Lena Luthor presses the elevator button, unaware that she’s about to hear something that will change everything.