Chapter Text
The first thing Alex Danvers noticed was the silence.
Not the ambient hum of a typical night in National City—the distant wail of sirens, the low growl of traffic, or the collective murmur of millions of lives unfolding beneath the smog. This was a suffocating, hollow stillness.
It was the quiet that only ever followed Kara.
Usually, if her sister vanished for more than a few minutes, the reason was loud. An explosion shattering glass, an armed heist, a falling airliner, or a frantic red alert lighting up the monitors at the DEO. Alex was intimately familiar with the rhythm of waiting. She knew the faint whoosh of wind just before the soft, heavy thud of red boots against the balcony floor; she knew the sight of curtains billowing around an open window, with Kara casually walking in and pretending she hadn't just broken the sound barrier.
Tonight, the glass was still cold. The window remained firmly latched.
And Kara was late.
"Did she log her coordinates before she left?" Alex asked, stepping into the command hub.
J’onn didn't look away from the holographic tactical display right away. When he did, the somber weight in his eyes made the room feel several degrees colder.
"She responded to a priority distress call near the docks," J’onn replied evenly, though the tension in his posture gave him away. "Reported structure fire in an abandoned warehouse."
A cold knot tightened in Alex’s chest. "A fire?"
"First responders reached the perimeter three minutes ago," J’onn said. "The building is completely cold. No smoke, no flames."
The knot twisted into a sickening vice. "Where is Kara?"
J’onn hesitated, his gaze dropping back toward the flickering data feeds.
Alex knew that hesitation. She recognized the precise, agonizing microsecond before bad news was delivered.
"J’onn. Look at me."
"We lost her comms," he said quietly. "Her bio-tracker went dark twelve seconds later."
Alex went completely rigid.
For a heartbeat, the oxygen caught in her throat. Her mind refused to entertain the idea of Kara being dead—Kara didn't simply die. Kara walked out of collapsing skyscrapers, shrugged off missile strikes, and traded blows with alien warlords that could level city blocks.
That was precisely what terrified her.
Alex knew every single entry on the very short list of things capable of tearing through Kryptonian skin. And she knew that someone, somewhere in the shadows, was always scheming to get their hands on them.
"Give me the sector," Alex commanded, her hand already dropping to the holster at her hip.
"National City Harbor. Pier 42."
She was already moving before the sentence finished, her boots striking hard against the metal grating.
"Alex, stand down," J’onn called out, his voice laced with commanding authority.
She didn't break stride.
"Alex! We don't go in blind. We need a tactical sweep and a full strike team."
"Then mobilize them!"
Her voice cracked across the cavernous room like a gunshot.
The entire DEO floor went dead silent. Analysts, agents, and tech operators froze at their stations, eyes darting toward the platform.
Alex stopped at the threshold of the armory. Her knuckles turned white around the frame of the doorway as she forced air into her lungs, trying to drown out the deafening roar of her own pulse against her temples.
When she turned around, her voice dropped to a razor-sharp whisper.
"Send the team, J'onn," she said, cold and unyielding. "But I'm going in first."
J’onn held her gaze, seeing the iron resolve that no protocol could ever break.
"I know," he replied softly.