17. Chapter 17(1)

It feels like every single day there are at least five alien abductions that Kara’s chasing – sometimes she arrives just in time, but most of the time too late. The stress has made both Kara and Lena agitated and exhausted so when Winn suggests they hold a game night, Lena gratefully agrees.

The last time they tried to have a game night it had been interrupted by a fifth dimensional attempt at a wedding so it’s not too hard to convince Kara to agree. Even if she does so very reluctantly.

“I still think we shouldn’t be here playing games,” Kara complains, but she still reaches across the board on the table and moves her piece to a new space. “We still know next to nothing about where Cadmus is taking the aliens they’ve been abducting.”

“Or what they want.” Mon-El adds, tipping his beer bottle Kara’s direction and idly playing with a set of dice in his free hand. “Because that is the trillion dollar question.”

Winn leans over and corrects him in a stage-whisper. “Million dollar question, buddy.”

Forehead creasing, Mon-El glances at Winn. “Really? That low?” Winn nods, but Mon-El doesn’t seem to believe it until he looks at Lena, who matches the gesture with an amused smile.

“The point is,” Winn says, drawing attention to him. “Kara, you’re right, but…I don’t know what else to do. I’ve monitored everything from traffic cams to cell phone chatter. Nothing.” He serves Alex a hesitant look before so pointedly not looking at her or Kara that he may as well be staring at them. “Maybe Jeremiah taught them how to avoid our radar.”

Neither Kara nor Alex seem to know what to say that. Alex looks down at the beer in her hand, picking at the label, and Kara – after seeing the clear distress in her sister’s face – leans over the table. “Okay, so we need to let people know so they can protect themselves. They have to know that Cadmus is out there abducting aliens.”

Against her will, a thread of discomfort churns in Lena’s gut for a moment. It’s still a harsh reality to swallow that when they talk of Cadmus they’re really talking about her mother.  

Mon-El puts a hand in the air. “We can make an announcement at the alien bar. Or like, post flyers,” he suggests, already looking like he might stand up and head to the bar right now.

Kara sits him back down with a hand on his shoulder. “That’s not enough. There are hundreds of aliens on that list. It’s not like every single one of them frequents the bar.”

“Maybe the DEO could issue a statement,” Winn says, but Alex shakes her head immediately.

“That would compromise the agency,” she tells him, finally looking up from where she’s nearly picked the entire label of the beer bottle off. “The DEO is off the books for a reason.”

“What if we did it anon-anonimiously?” Mon-El says, fumbling with the word in his mouth and looking confused.

Lena drops her head closer to him and whispers, “Anonymously.”

“Yeah, that,” he says, pointing at her.

“No one would take us seriously,” Kara says.

“I’d offer L Corp’s platform, but I doubt that would be taken much more seriously,” Lena says with a wry smile twisting the stem of her wine glass. “Everyone’s well aware of the Luthor-Cadmus connection.”

Something stormy goes across Kara’s face, but it’s gone as quick as it came. “Maybe I could write an article for CatCo. Get Snapper to promote it,” Kara says, brightening at the idea.

Alex looks skeptical and Lena pretty much shares the emotion. The two of them exchange wary glances before Alex asks, “You really think Snapper would run that?”

“Totally.” Kara waves her off, clearly happy at the idea of solving a problem.

--

The abductions continue. The next day, there are two of them by the time Lena turns the news on over her lunch hour. Another that afternoon and Lena wonders if Kara’s had any success at work this morning.

From the way Kara’s face looks when she picks Lena up at the office for drinks, it’s clear Snapper wasn’t quite as enthusiastic about her article as Kara had been.

A quirk of her brow seems enough communication for Kara to tell her as much.

“He’s the worst,” Kara says as they walk out of her office and towards the elevator, Kara reaching behind her without even looking to grab Lena’s hand. “Said Supergirl wasn’t a good enough source.”

Alone in the elevator, Lena laughs a little, leans against the back wall and close to Kara’s side. “Don’t you think using Supergirl as your only source all the time is suspicious?”

Kara shrugs, eyes trained on the numbers counting down on the display above the doors. “Clark does it.”

The elevator stops at the lobby and they step out. “So what are you going to do?”

“I told Snapper he should interview Supergirl herself,” she says as they stride through the massive lobby floor. Lena sends small smiles to the night shift security guards just coming on and lets Kara lead them towards a waiting black town car out front.

“You think that will work?” Lena asks as Kara holds the door open and they pace outside.

“I mean, I hope so,” Kara replies. “Supergirl can be pretty convincing when she wants to be.”

“Of that,” Lena laughs, “I have no doubt.”

They slide into the back of the car and Lena gives her driver the address of a cross street not far from the alien bar they’re set to meet the rest of their friends at.

“You know I could fly us there,” Kara whispers even though Lena’s already put up the privacy partition in the car. Lena watches as she fiddles with the door controls, opening the window just a crack and breathing in the air.

Lena just rolls her eyes. “You’ll survive the five minute car ride,” she says and Kara’s lips thin as if she’s holding back a smile.

“Five minutes?!” The words are drawn out with exaggerated incredulity and this time Kara’s not able to hold back the teasing smile nor the laugh that comes bursting out of her and Lena just rolls her eyes, shoves a little at Kara’s side.

Instead of falling over like Kara would usually do, she captures Lena’s hand in her own and tugs until they’re pressed against each other in the backseat. It pulls a surprised little gasp out of Lena, but before she can let out an indignant squeak of Kara’s name, Kara’s nosing forward and suddenly they’re kissing.

Rational thought abandons her brain for a few seconds because Kara’s lips feel really good and they haven’t kissed all day and the car gets warm real fast.

“What are you doing?” Lena murmurs when Kara pulls back enough for her to speak.

Kara just smiles, kisses her again, slides a hand across Lena’s hip under her jacket. “Surviving the five minute car ride,” she says cheekily and Lena thinks she should probably roll her eyes again, but instead she just fists the fabric of Kara’s shirt in her fingers and pulls her forward.

The five – more like ten – minute car ride goes disappointingly fast after that because Kara keeps kissing her and Lena lets her hands wander a little inappropriately. By the time the car is pulling to a stop, Lena’s breathing heavily and her cheeks feel flushed and for a few seconds she considers what kind of excuses they could give their friends for not showing up.

Seeming to read her mind, Kara laughs – the sound a little hoarse and thick in a way that does nothing to quell the heat in Lena’s gut. “We can’t ditch. I promised Alex.”

Lena clears her throat, smooths her palms over the wrinkled clothing over Kara’s chest and pushes her there, hard enough for Kara to notice. “Then you need to move away from me.”

With one last kiss that turns into two and then three, Kara finally pulls far enough away that Lena’s able to straighten her clothing and fix her makeup in the small pulldown mirror from the car’s ceiling.

When they finally get inside, Maggie and Alex are already at the pool table in what looks to be a deeply contested game of pool. It’s a bit unusual – Alex usually wipes the floor with anyone she plays against – but judging from the look on her face, Alex isn’t celebrating her usual victory.

Winn and James are at a high-top conversing with each other and when Winn spots Lena, he waves them over.

“Hey guys,” Kara greets, leaning to air kiss James’s cheek and then Winn’s. Lena gives them both a similar greeting before taking her seat at a stool.

“What are we drinking?” James says, seeming uncharacteristically enthusiastic, but Lena chalks it up to the empty whiskey glass in front of him. “First round’s on me.”

“You needn’t do that, James,” Lena says, tilting her head a bit to the side.

“I’m totally fine if you do that, James,” Winn interjects, pushing his empty beer glass forward.

James laughs even as Kara swats a little at Winn’s arm. “Okay,” James says, standing and collecting the empties on the table. “Usual?”

Everyone murmurs assent and James is off to the bar. Winn turns immediately to Lena to start discussing an idea for a new flamethrower addition to his latest battle bot – Judge Shredd. Kara puts her hand on Lena’s thigh in a warm, possessive gesture and Lena finds herself leaning into it. There’s a lingering heat between them from the car, but it’s muted now, comfortable and Lena sinks into it.

For a moment, she allows herself to forget about all the bad happening – the abductions, Cadmus, her mother – and lets the now-familiar feeling of being with these people and with Kara drape over her. It feels suspiciously like family, but Lena’s not sure if that’s real or just how it’s always felt to be with Kara.

“What do you think, Lena?” Winn asks her when he’s done explaining his idea. James returns to the table and hands Lena a cocktail.

She takes a sip before responding. “I think no matter how much firepower you give the thing he’s never going to beat Steg-O-Saw-Us.”

Kara chokes on her drink a bit and turns an amused look on Lena. “You named it Steg-O-Saw-Us? How did you become worse at naming your robots since college?”

“You’re just mad I never went with any of your suggestions,” Lena says, lifting her chin a bit haughtily.

“Squirmin’ Vermin was a great name,” Kara insists and this time it’s Winn that chokes on his drink as he tries to stop a laugh.

Lena doesn’t hold back and neither does James and it ends with Kara just glaring at all three of them.

--

They’ve barely gotten through their first round of drinks when Kara’s phone goes off with a DEO alert and she sighs, bumping a bit into Lena’s side and showing her the screen.

“Robbery on 13th street,” Lena reads and James perks up, leans a bit as if to read Kara’s phone.

“You need help?” He asks and Kara waves him off.

“No, no, you stay here. This will only take a second,” Kara says and she glances to where Alex and Maggie are playing pool.

“You sure?” James says, following Kara’s look, but clearly unable to interpret her expression.

Lena can guess what’s running through Kara’s mind if Alex’s sullen expression is anything to go by, but she stays silent. Danvers Sister Drama has ways of working itself out.

“Yeah totally,” she says, stepping up from her stool and taking a long swig from a glass of water on the table. “I’ll be back in no time. You won’t even notice I’m gone.”

“I doubt that,” Winn says with a friendly smile that Kara returns before looking down at Lena.

“Are you going to be okay here?” Kara asks softly and Lena dismisses her with a wave of her hand.

“Go,” she says, and noses forward to press a solid kiss to Kara’s lips. “Duty calls.”

The blue of Kara’s eyes dances prettily when she smiles and she pushes forward for another quick kiss. “Okay, I love you.”

Lena just smiles. “Be careful,” she calls out as Kara walks away, weaving in and out of chairs and other bar patrons.

“Always!” Kara shouts back with a grin, turning to walk a few steps backwards before bumping into a table and nearly spilling a pitcher of beer all over its three occupants.

Lena smothers a laugh with her hand and turns away from Kara’s sheepish grin and stuttered apologies.

It occurs to her that it no longer feels as awkward as it once did to be alone with Winn and James – Kara’s friends. From the way Winn carries on conversation after Kara’s left it’s starting to feel like they’re her friends too. Kara aside.

They talk about random things – what’s been going on at CatCo with James at the helm, a quick story about Winn’s latest dating failure – Mon-El is currently out to dinner with a woman that had handily rejected Winn after only one date – and an anecdote about L Corp’s latest reveal about a new energy project.

They order a second round of drinks and when Winn returns to hand them out he leans forward at the table, hands gripping his beer. “So, I just heard this great joke at the bar – about the Valerian that goes into the coffee shop -”

The punch line to Winn’s joke never comes. Instead the whole bar gets rattled with the sound of an explosion and crashing sounds and Lena’s thrown off to the side. She hits James – or who she thinks to be James – in the chest and they both go sprawling across the floor.

It’s a chaotic mess of sound and confusion after that. A group of people storm into the bar wearing tactical gear and holding guns and Lena feels frozen in shock until James shakes her out of it, picking her up off the floor and pulling them to safety behind the cover of an overturned table.

“You okay?” He asks, holding her by the biceps. They both flinch when another explosion rips through the building and suddenly Winn is scrambling near them, hunching behind the bar a few feet away.

Distantly she hears the sound of struggling, Alex’s voice yelling, “Get down!”

Winn lets out a low expletive, but loud enough for Lena to hear it and turn towards him with worried eyes. He’s holding his phone in his hands but from the look on his face and the cracked screen she can just make out it seems it’s not any use to him. “Someone call Kara,” he says to them, throwing his phone to the side and sneaking a peek around the corner of the bar.

On instinct, Lena flips the face of her watch open and suddenly realizes that…James is doing the same thing.

The watch face on his wrist is flipped open to reveal the crest of the House of El and they both look up at each other, frozen for the moment until the sound of a gun going off makes both of them startle out of it.

“Clark gave it to me,” James blurts like this is an appropriate time for any kind of explanation and Lena can’t think about what all this means or the wide-eyed look James is getting or anything really so she just pushes the button on her watch and hunkers down when a bar stool goes flying over their heads and cracks against the wall.

“Winn!” James calls out over Lena’s shoulder. “Armor?”

“In the car,” Winn shouts back, gesturing towards a back exit, and without hesitation James is up and sprinting towards the door, barreling through it and away.

“Oh shit,” Winn says when a body goes sliding across the floor between them – one of their attackers in full tactical gear. Lena peeks over the table to see Alex engaged in a fight, Maggie at her back with her gun drawn.

The man on the floor starts to stand up and Lena can’t think to do anything else. She stands and grabs the nearest thing she can, a wooden chair, and with all the strength she can muster smacks it over the guy’s head.

Winn has a kind of awed expression when she glances at him and the man attempting to stand has slumped back down on the ground in an unconscious heap.

But the awe turns to a fear as he looks over Lena’s shoulder and she turns to see another of the attackers levelling a gun at her. It ratchets her heartrate up tenfold and she puts her hands up defensively, shifting just a bit to put her body in front of Winn’s and forcing her expression to remain defiant.

These guys have Cadmus written all over them and it’ll be a cold day in Hell when she cows to some low-rate thug hired by her mother.

“Lena,” Winn says slowly and with warning as he clambers up off the floor to stand behind her.

“Hello,” the man says in a slow wondering tone. He takes his hand off the gun to pull his ski-mask off and reveal his face. It strikes her as immediately familiar, but she can’t place it. He’s bald, a severe nose, and he’s looking at her like he knows who she is. He likely does. All things considered.

“I’m sorry. Have we met?”

“Oh, your mother is going to be very happy with me,” he says with a sardonic smile and Lena’s stomach drops, unsure if she’s going to be shot or kidnapped. She can feel Winn tense even more behind her and she silently pleads with him not to do anything stupid.

To her right, Alex is busy fending off two people and Maggie’s running after one of the brutes trying to abduct a Dhorian Lena’s seen in the bar a few times.

Just as she’s set to try and talk her way out of getting shot, another crash echoes through the building. It’s James. In full Guardian gear coming in through the door and smacking one of the guys attacking Alex with his shield.

It’s just the opening she needs to move forward and without even thinking about how stupid this plan is, she goes to grab the gun in the guy’s hand, hoping to use the element of surprise to her favor.

It nearly works. Her hands hit his and his arm goes up, the gun now not pointed directly at her face, but he’s strong. Too strong. And she realizes it just a second too late. Without so much as breaking a sweat he just throws his hand forward and shoves her to the ground.

She lands with a painful smack and then Winn is right next to her on his knees, a hand outstretched in front of her as if he could stop the bullet just like that.

In an instant, Lena feels the air in the room float with stillness. The look on the man’s face telling her he is absolutely going to pull the trigger and Alex realizing what’s happening just a moment too late – cracking a pool cue over a guy’s head and letting out a surprised shout as she takes in the scene.

Lena thinks maybe she should close her eyes or push Winn away, but then everything revs back into regular motion and the room heats up and before Lena can think another thought a blue and red blur explodes a massive hole in the far wall of the bar and crashes heavily into the man.

The two of them hit a pool table and it splits in two until they’re on the ground and Lena can practically feel the pure fury rolling off Kara in waves. Not that she’d need to know it was happening; it’d be apparent to just about anyone.

Kara lets out what can only be described as something between a growl and a yell before she punches the guy in the face so hard it reverbs through the room and Lena lets out a silent prayer Kara didn’t just accidentally kill this guy.

Everyone in the room stalls at the sound, unsure what to do and Lena catches some of the Cadmus agents scrambling for the exit, running as fast as they can to get away.

Alex just eyes her sister as she pulls back for another punch and somehow it’s Alex’s ashen expression that makes Lena feel like she can function enough to scramble to her feet.

“Supergirl!” Lena shouts out, mindful of where they are even if it takes an extra second of thought not to use Kara’s name. It’s likely there are only friends left in the bar apart from the very obviously unconscious Cadmus agent, but Lena doesn’t want to risk it.  “Supergirl!”

It takes a third shout of her name and a closing of proximity to get Kara to stop. Alex shakes out of her freeze and does the same and suddenly Kara is zooming up off him and looking around with a crazed look.

She bolts immediately for Lena. “I heard the signal, are you okay?”

Lena nods, a calm infusing through her the second Kara gets close enough to pull her into a tight hug. Lena’s face gets pushed into Kara’s collarbone, a strong hand holding the back of her head and she knows that if she takes the time to think about what just happened she might actually lose it.

So instead, she clears her throat softly and moves against Kara’s hold, subtly tugging at her cape in a signal to let her go. “I’m okay,” Lena murmurs softly until Kara’s hand relaxes and Lena’s able to move.

Kara looks over her head at Winn. “You good?”

“Yeah,” Winn says, dusting his hands over his pants and looking a little shell-shocked.

Maggie comes jogging back into the room, gun drawn and breathing hard. “What happened?” She moves next to Alex, puts a hand at your elbow. “Alex? You okay?”

Alex nods and then moves towards the Cadmus agent lying unmoving on the ground between the broken shards of a pool table. His face is bloodied from Kara’s punch, but when Alex puts her fingers to his neck she says, “Let’s get him the DEO.”

With quick movement, Kara is suddenly cradling Lena up in her arms. “I’ll fly us.”

Kara doesn’t wait for a reply, just turns and flies straight out of the hole she’d created earlier. “Kara,” Lena protests, startled at the abrupt departure. “We should probably help-“

“They’re fine,” Kara says and Lena hears how shaky Kara’s voice is. There’s something tenuous in the hold Kara has on Lena’s legs and she’s not entirely surprised when Kara lands on a nearby rooftop that is not the DEO.

“Hey,” Lena says softly when Kara sets her down. “Everything’s okay.”

“Adrenaline crash,” Kara explains, heaving in a breath uncharacteristically and Lena doesn’t hesitate before bringing Kara’s hand up and pressing it against her chest. Kara watches the movement and her breathing seems to calm immediately.

Lena smooths her hand down Kara’s arm, passing over the heavy metal of her bracelet, stays in close and watches her face. “Kryptonians produce epinephrine?”

With a laugh, Kara’s head droops forward a bit, presses against Lena’s until they’re more solidly hovered in each other’s airspace. “Don’t try to distract me with science.”

A lump in her throat at the memory of a gun being pointed at her face surfaces. “Maybe I’m trying to distract me.”

Blue eyes connect solidly with her own, wide and searching. “I shouldn’t have left you there. Of all the-"

“You couldn’t have known,” Lena says, shaking her head. “Let’s just go to the DEO, debrief the situation and then go home and open a case of wine.”

After a moment hesitation, eyes darting over Lena’s face, Kara nods. “Yeah, okay, you’re right.”

“Hey,” Lena says, stopping Kara just as she bends to sweep Lena back up into her arms. Kara pauses mid-motion, tilts her head inquiringly. “I love you.”

Kara doesn’t smile, but her eyes go soft and vivid before she kisses Lena – heavy and sure – and murmurs the words back in her native language.

--

It’s quiet in Lena’s dorm room. A lazy kind of Saturday morning.

Most of campus is likely still asleep – tired from a late night of partying and the like. But Lena’s wide awake and on the floor of her bedroom tinkering with her latest robot. The coffee table that usually sits in front of her couch has been pushed off to the side. The floor is littered with parts and tools.

Kara is spread out on the ground next to her, half under the raised bed. She’s been alternating between sleeping and blearily watching Lena work, occasionally attempting to help. There aren’t many people Lena feels comfortable enough to let them hover around her work; she had once thrown a wrench at Lex when he suggested an adjustment offhand. But Kara doesn’t seem to bother her.

“That’s the wrong one,” Kara comments absently, her voice low and sleepy, when Lena picks a small screw up from a pile without really looking.

“No it’s –“ Lena just purses her lips when the screw won’t fit in the hole it’s meant to go in and she tosses it at Kara’s face before sifting through the pile again to find the right one.

“Just trying to help,” Kara says with a laugh, after lazily swiping the screw out of the air and putting it back in the pile it came from.

“Sure you are,” Lena says, focusing back on the chassis she’s currently assembling and pulling her tape measure along its length. “Help me and write down that I need to cut a...twenty-eight inch panel. Or - thirty and I’ll weld it in.”

Kara hums as she grabs for the legal pad, scratching out something that looks nothing like what Lena’s just said. It’s a strange series of lines and curves that she’s never seen before. She’d think Kara was having a stroke if she wasn’t also pretty sure Kara couldn’t have strokes.

“Darling,” Lena says, reaching over to press her hand against Kara’s back. Kara hums again, turning her sleepy eyes to Lena for a moment before she glances back down at the legal pad and blinking down at it.

“Oh, that’s - sorry,” Kara murmurs, starting to erase what she’s just written. But Lena grabs for it, adjusting her glasses and looking down at the series of symbols. Kara sits up a little more, her hand still loosely gripping the notepad.

"Is this - is this Kryptonian?” Lena asks. Kara eyes her for a moment before she nods slowly, her hand dropping away from the pages in Lena’s grip and her posture loosening into a slouch. “What does it say?”

“It says you need to cut a thirty inch panel,” Kara says. “I haven’t done that in a while, sorry. I think it’s because I’m still half-asleep. Maybe because my girlfriend woke me up at five.”

Ignoring the teasing look of admonishment on Kara’s face, Lena traces her fingers across the series of lines on the page. “How do you say this?”

Kara blinks owlishly at her, and she rubs at her nose where her glasses usually sit.

After a moment of hesitation, she finally says something that approximates an utterly foreign series of sounds, her hands twisting together in the space between them. Lena is utterly endeared to her, can’t help but lean forward and press a kiss to Kara’s lips that has Kara inching closer.

“Will you teach me?” Lena asks. Kara stares at her, her blue eyes wide as though she’s surprised by the question. Why she would be, Lena doesn’t know - of course she wants to know more about Kara’s culture and life.

“You want to learn Kryptonian?” Kara asks and when Lena nods slowly, Kara’s eyes dart to the side. “It’s sort of a - I mean it’s a dead -” The words choke a bit in Kara’s mouth and make Lena’s chest ache at the forlorn look on Kara’s face. “It’s not like it’s very relevant.”

Lena frowns at that, dropping the screwdriver in her hand and sliding closer to Kara, who easily moves to make room for her.

“It’s relevant to me,” she says, stroking her fingers over Kara’s temples, pushing hair back behind her ears and smiling down at sleepy blue eyes. “I’d like to learn. If you’d be okay teaching me.”

Kara’s face seems to still before doing a number of things Lena doesn’t know how to interpret, but she stays silent, let’s Kara work out whatever is going through her mind.

Just before Lena thinks to maybe take the suggestion back - Kara nods and a soft smile spreads over her lips. She says something indecipherable, but smooth sounding and Lena blinks, confused before Kara laughs. “It means I’ll teach you in Kryptonian,” Kara says soft and light.  

“How do you say thank you?” Lena asks, thumbing across Kara’s bottom lip and shifting more squarely into her space.

Kara tells her and Lena watches the words form in Kara’s mouth. “I like how you sound when you speak it,” Lena says in a soft murmur, the truth pulling out of her before she can stop it. Her cheeks warm a bit at how flirty it comes out, but she doesn’t take it back and Kara’s smiling.

“I already said I’d teach you,” Kara jokes, but she’s already sliding a hand around Lena’s waist and turning them over on the floor. “You don’t need to convince me.”

Her laughter is swallowed when Kara kisses her and presses her into the floor. Her project abandoned, they spend the rest of the morning tangled together trading words in different languages and forgetting about the outside world for a long while.

--

“Do we know how many people they were able to take?” J’onn asks, pacing across the floors of the DEO central platform. They’d gone over their stories after taking their prisoner – Griggs, they’d found out – to holding.

A small video monitor shows a feed of his cell and Lena can’t help but glance at it every so often. He’s conscious now and sitting on a chair, his face swollen and lip busted. But he looks unconcerned, even though Alex had given her medical report of a fractured orbital bone.

“It was chaos,” Alex says, answering J’onn’s question. “Everyone made a break for it, but it was too hard to tell.”

Maggie’s right next to her, arms crossed over her chest. “I saw a couple of them get into a black van and get away, but I didn’t get a headcount or see faces.”

J’onn sighs, arms propped at his hips. “Okay. I’ll see what I can learn from Griggs. The rest of you, get cleaned up and go home.”

“J’onn,” Alex starts, sounding a lot like she’s going to protest, but J’onn cuts her a glare, looking authoritative and somehow dad-like.

“That’s an order, Agent Danvers. Get some rest.”

Maggie watches the interaction silently, looking like she can’t decide between backing up her girlfriend or dragging her home for the ordered rest.

Alex’s shoulders deflate. “Can I at least stay until after you’ve questioned him?”

J’onn mulls it over, lips thinning for a moment. “Very well. But the rest of you, go home.”

The group murmurs their assent to the order and Kara presses a kiss to Lena’s temple. It feels shaky, but warm. “Stay here. I need to talk to Alex really quick.”

Lena nods, squeezes Kara’s fingers before they let go of each other’s hands and she’s left standing next to Winn.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Winn asks, hand moving to grip lightly at her elbow. It warms up her arm, but she can’t stop thinking about Kara and she spares her a glance before answering.

“It’s been awhile since someone from my family tried to have me killed,” Lena says, using the only coping mechanism she really knows. “Almost feels comforting.”

Winn’s lips twist. “They were there for the aliens,” he says, voice soft and careful.

“And I was a bonus,” she adds pointedly. “Don’t act like you didn’t see the way his eyes lit up when he recognized me.”

Winn doesn’t deny it. Doesn’t say much at all, but sighs, a sad look on his face as he gives her a short nod. “I’m glad you’re okay,” he murmurs with a last squeeze to her arm before walking away towards where James is talking to Mon-El, who had just arrived.

Then Kara is striding towards her, all tense lines of muscle, cape swishing around her legs. She’s an imposing figure, but Lena can read through the hard line in her jaw to the worry she knows is threatening to break through.

“You ready?” Kara asks, when she gets close and her eyes roam Lena’s face – likely checking – for the tenth time – for injuries.

“Yes,” Lena answers, reaching out to touch Kara’s arm and smiling at her until she feels the cord of muscle there relax just the slightest. “Home?”

Kara nods and lets a smile poke through before reaching over to scoop Lena into her arms. Lena thinks to protest – it’s not like they’re at the landing platform and she can very well walk there herself, but asking Kara to put her down right now feels like the wrong move.

--

It’s not until they’re back at Lena’s apartment that Lena really lets herself start to process what just happened.

The first thing she does is walk into her bedroom and change out of her pencil skirt and blouse, trading it for a pair of well worn yoga pants and a soft tank top. The second thing she does is move to her bathroom in the hopes of washing her face and collecting herself, but as soon as she’s in front of the mirror the image of a gun hovering in front of her spikes hotly through her memory.

It’s not the first time she’s had a gun pointed at her. Not even the second. Definitely not a new experience to have her life threatened or to be in serious danger. But for whatever reason, this time is hitting her so much harder than any of the others. Maybe it’s because this time she’s aware of all that she has to lose.  

Hot tears appear in the back of her eyes and it takes every ounce of control she has not to break down crying. She knows Kara would hear her – has likely already picked up on the spike in her heartbeat – and she’d burst in here to find out what’s wrong which would probably just end with the both of them crying on the bathroom floor. Not a productive end to their evening.

“I’m fine,” she whispers to herself before picking her head up and making eye contact with her reflection. “You’re fine.”

Kara’s voice startles her from the other side of the door. “Lena? You okay?”

Rubbing slightly at her eyes and taking a deep breath, Lena settles her expression and opens the door. “Yeah, of course. Just washing up,” she says to Kara’s waiting form. It seems Kara’s changed as well – gone is the red and blue of her suit, replaced with pajama pants a few inches too long and an oversized sweater Lena knows Kara favors when she’s emotional.

“Food?” Lena offers, reaching out to tangle her fingers in the soft, warm fabric on Kara’s body.

“How about that case of wine you promised,” Kara counters, stepping forward to wrap Lena up in a tight hug.

“That sounds better,” Lena agrees. Maybe the alcohol will calm some of the lingering nerves and make it so when she sleeps that night she doesn’t have to relive the moment she was sure she was about to be shot.

But Kara doesn’t move away from her right away, just tightens her arms solidly around Lena’s back and puts her lips against the crown of Lena’s head.

“You’ve never used the watch before,” Kara says, quietly into Lena’s hair.

Startled by the thought, Lena just blinks a moment before realizing Kara’s right. “I-I…I didn’t really think about it,” she says trying to remember the moment. There hadn’t been a hesitation about using her watch. As soon as she was in safety behind the table and she realized they needed to call Kara her fingers just flipped open its face.

“I’m kind of happy to find out it works.” Kara takes a deep inhale, her chest expanding against Lena’s head. “Small comforts, I guess.”

There’s a haunted tone to Kara’s voice, a sound Lena feels sympathetic to.

“James had one too,” Lena says, remembering the moment when James was pressing at his own watch just like hers. “Like mine.”

Without the benefit of being able to see Kara’s face, Lena’s not so sure what the seconds of silence might mean, but then Kara says, “Kal gave it to him. Not me.”

“He said that.” Lena scratches softly with the fingers she still has against Kara’s stomach. Tries to reassure her that she didn’t mean anything about the comment.

“It sounds different,” Kara adds in a soft voice, sounding no less haunted than before. Lena just wants to make it better. Aches to do so really. She takes a deep breath.

“Wine,” she says definitively and she taps against Kara’s abs in a signal to let her go.

“Wine,” Kara agrees after a beat of silence, but not before nosing forward into Lena’s personal space and kissing her swiftly. “I’m really glad you’re okay.”

“Let’s focus on that,” Lena says, putting her arms around Kara’s neck and feeling something settle in her soul when Kara responds by lifting her up into the kiss just like she always does.

“Let’s,” Kara murmurs against Lena’s lips before walking them towards the kitchen with a smile.

--

The next day, Kara flies out the door early, but not so early that she doesn’t get them both coffee and a box of donuts before she goes – we deserve donuts is Kara’s explanation for the two dozen treats that are on the kitchen counter when Lena walks in.

Lena heads into work in her favorite power dress, the red one that makes her feel commanding and confident. She wears it to board meetings sometimes just to gain an upper hand against a room full of old white men, some of whom still have not fully accepted her authority.

Alana is waiting for her with a cup of coffee and Lena takes it with a grateful smile. “Have Lana Lang meet me in my office whenever she’s available,” she tells her as she walks behind her desk and Alana nods politely before scurrying off to do just that.

By the time Lana arrives in her office, Lena has managed to make it through a phone call with an exuberant stockholder in Germany.

“Hey, sorry it took a bit for me to get up here,” Lana says, dropping into the chair across from Lena’s desk. “One of the labs was doing a demo that might have burst into literal flames.” 

“I miss when my days were putting out literal fires instead of figurative ones,” Lena says, with an exaggerated sigh. It’s not as if her life lacks excitement these days, but at the office she’d take the underground labs Lana spends her time in over her top floor office any day. Lana shrugs, tugging at her name badge with a grin.

“My job now, boss,” Lana says. “What’d you need?”

Playing with a pen on her desk, Lena glances quickly to her office doors. “It’s a bit sensitive in nature. I asked for you because - well because I trust you.”

Lana blinks as if surprised by the admission, but Lena knows it to be true. She’s already involved Lana in so many parts of her life at this point it shouldn’t be too shocking. “Okay,” Lana says, suddenly much more serious as she sits up in the chair and tilts her head to the side. “What’s wrong? What can I do?”

“As I’m sure you’re aware,” Lena starts, setting the pen down so she stops fidgeting with it. “My mother is behind Cadmus.”

Lana nods slowly. “It’s been well publicized.”

“Indeed,” Lena says with a wry quirk of her brow. “A few weeks ago, Cadmus managed to get their hands on the National Alien Registry.”

At the information, Lana’s eyes start to go wide. “How do you know that?”

It occurs to her for a heartbeat that maybe it sounds like Lena is in fact working for Cadmus and she scrambles to clarify. “I’m working with Supergirl.”

“To get the registry back?” Lana asks, forehead creasing as she tries to but the pieces together.

Lena shakes her head. “It seems Cadmus is using the registry to abduct aliens around National City. We’re not yet sure why they’re taking them or what they’re planning to do, but we’ve been searching for them. I have a feeling that -” Lena sighs and in the pause, Lana jumps in.

“You think your mother might be using old Luthor Corp resources,” Lana ventures and the purposeful look on Lana’s face reassures Lena that she made a good choice in trusting her.

“When Lex ran the company, she was on the Board,” Lena says even though she knows Lana’s likely aware of this. “And you’re the only person I know with the company back then that I can trust with this.”

“I’ll get right on it,” Lana says, standing up from her chair. “I mean, I know how this superhero supervillain game works. There’s always a warehouse, right?”

It makes Lena laugh a little. “There’s always a warehouse,” she repeats with a grin.

“Then let’s find the warehouse,” Lana says gamely and she paces forward to reach across the desk and grab Lena’s hand - a surprisingly personal move for the overtly professional setting. “We’ll find her, Lena.”

Lena squeezes Lana’s fingers. “Thank you, Lana.”

Lana shakes her head, but smiles warmly. “Thank me when we win.”

The confidence in her tone sustains Lena through the rest of her morning - all the way until Kara shows up in her office around lunch with a weary expression on her face.

“Snapper just interviewed Supergirl,” Kara tells her, dropping down into the same chair Lana had occupied just a few hours ago.

“And?” Lena asks, sending off some last minute e-mails she wants to get out before she breaks for lunch.

“I don’t know,” Kara replies, blowing out an exasperated breath so hard that it ruffles some papers on Lena’s desk. Kara’s face goes sheepish. “Sorry.”

Lena just laughs. “What do you want for lunch?”

“Any chance I could convince you to take the afternoon off and work from home?” Kara asks with a kind of plea in her voice and face that Lena’s helpless to resist. As if she’d want to deny Kara something she clearly needs.

It should be telling that the thought of playing hooky from work a few months ago was abhorrent to Lena, but now, with Kara draped across her office chair sending her inviting eyes, Lena can’t think of any better way to spend her afternoon.

“I could probably be convinced,” Lena says with a smile and a crooked sly sort of grin spreads over Kara’s face.

--

She and Kara spend the afternoon at Lena’s apartment, congregated at the kitchen island with both their laptops up and running. They order in for lunch and then for dinner and by early evening Kara starts to exchange e-mails with Snapper about his Supergirl interview and Kara’s hopes to publish an article about Cadmus. From the deepening frown on Kara’s face, the exchange isn’t going well.

It culminates in Kara shoving her laptop angrily across the counter and standing up, hands clenched in rage as she begins a rant about her boss the likes of which Lena’s rarely seen.

“It’s so stupid. This could save lives, it’s important and it’s a story. I wish he could see that.”

“Why don’t you call Cat?” Lena suggests, watching as Kara paces back and forth across the floor of the kitchen.

“Because it doesn’t feel right to go over his head like that. Even if he is being super dumb,” Kara says. “And I told myself I wouldn’t ask Cat to fix all my problems.”

Kara looks adorably determined in that last bit, making a definitive sweeping motion with her hand as if to end the discussion.

Lena turns back to her work, opens up the file she’d asked Lana to put together as Kara plops down onto a stool next to her and flips open her laptop. “This is the worst,” Kara groans, letting her head fall to the countertop with a soft thud.

It’s just heavy enough that Lena looks up quickly to make sure Kara hasn’t cracked the surface before going back to her computer.

“If it’s that important to you, Kara, then find a way to publish it,” she says, almost absently as she flips through some of the information Lana had sent her.

“I’m trying, but Snapper just keeps putting up walls,” Kara complains, taking her glasses off to rub at her eyes tiredly. Lena glances up and watches the motion, a soft affectionate smile taking hold on her face.

“I meant self-publish,” Lena clarifies. “Like a blog or something. Start a hashtag. Tweet the hell out of it. People trust you to deliver the truth when it comes to aliens.”

A thoughtful look crosses Kara’s face for a moment, pen tapping against her lips. “That’s not a bad idea,” she murmurs, looking into the distance.

“I don’t have anything but good ideas,” Lena says with a faux haughty tone that draws Kara’s attention back to her with a soft laugh.

“Peanut butter and pickle sandwiches,” Kara replies, a pointed look on her face as she wags her pen in Lena’s direction.

Rolling her eyes, Lena goes back to her laptop. “Ideas I have whilst intoxicated don’t count.” Kara hums through a smile that Lena takes a glance at and blushes. “Don’t look at me like that when we have so much work to do.”

“Sorry,” Kara says, not sounding at all apologetic. But she returns to her own laptop and Lena enjoys the sound of Kara typing away at an almost inhuman speed, but just slow enough to be believable.

After a few minutes of working, Kara sighs, taps her pen against an open notepad to her right for a few seconds before saying, “Snapper will flip.”

“You don’t have to put your name on it,” Lena says, but Kara just shakes her head.

“It has to be credible. That’s the only way.”

Lena looks at her then, a little more serious as she watches the conflict play across Kara’s features. “I can’t make this decision for you,” Lena says softly and she reaches out to touch Kara’s hand. “You need to decide what the right thing to do is and then do it.”

That seems to settle something in Kara because she straightens a bit and gives a final-looking nod before pressing a button on her laptop.

“Well? Did you blob it?” Lena asks and then laughs at Kara’s adorable look of confusion. “Mon-El’s been learning internet slang. I overheard him asking Winn how to blob the other day.”

Kara rolls her eyes, but laughs, her shoulders relaxing just a bit as she closes her computer. “Yes, I blobbed it,” she says, sounding a mixture between satisfied and resigned.

“Do you feel better?”

“I’ll feel better when we stop Cadmus,” Kara says, turning a poignant look at Lena that makes her squeeze Kara’s fingers.

“We’ll stop them,” she says with as much conviction as she can muster. “For what it’s worth, I would have done the same thing.”

Kara smiles, but the expression gets a bit shaky and Lena can feel a barely perceptible tremble go through the hand clasped in hers.

“Kara?” Lena asks, concerned with the sudden and swift change in mood on Kara’s face. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Kara denies, but her voice cracks a bit on the word.

“Are you okay?” Lena says, standing and moving closer in hopes proximity will pull the truth out of Kara.

“I’m fine,” Kara says but her tone so clearly betrays her and she deflates, a panicked look entering her eyes. “Sometimes when I close my eyes I can hear your watch go off,” Kara admits in a small voice. “And then I see that guy with the gun and I hear your heartbeat and-“

Lena stops the stream of words with a soft shhh and her hands at Kara’s cheeks. The fear and panic mixing in Kara’s voice is something intimately familiar. There are still nights when Lena hears Kara screaming in pain, the green glow of kryptonite flashing in her veins while her mother smiles.

With insistent hands, Lena manages to pull Kara’s head into her chest and hold her there in a tight hug. She presses a warm kiss to the crown of her head and feels Kara take in a deep breath. “We need a vacation,” Lena murmurs and after a second Kara laughs.

“Bora Bora?”

“No,” Lena replies immediately, the word coming out on a laugh. She smiles where her lips are still pressed in to Kara’s hair. “We can go literally anywhere else. I don’t know if you know this, but I’m rich.”

Kara laughs again, relaxes further into Lena’s hold and Lena’s heart feels warm and full and satisfied knowing that she can do this to Kara – for Kara. “Vacation sounds nice.”

“I have a boat,” Lena adds and feels Kara’s fingers clench a bit in the fabric at Lena’s hips where they’re resting. “Multiple boats actually.”

“I like boats.”

“Me too,” Lena says, kissing Kara’s head again.

They stay there, tangled in each other, for a long comfortable minute. Lena sinks into the feeling of holding Kara together, of feeling her relax inch by inch the longer they touch.

“Sorry,” Kara sighs, her arms sliding to tighten around Lena’s waist and her ear pressing against Lena’s sternum.

“Don’t be,” Lena says, pulling Kara’s head away to look her in the eye. She strokes her fingers across Kara’s temples, rearranging errant hairs behind her ear. “Like I said, we both need a vacation.”

Kara hums agreeably, eyes fluttering closed as Lena continues to stroke her fingers through her hair.

The moment is broken by the suddenly loud vibration of Kara’s phone that nearly buzzes off the counter before Kara’s hand shouts out to grab it. Just as Kara swipes to answer it, Lena spots Winn’s contact picture – a selfie of the two of them wearing matching top hats and oversized heart shaped glasses.

“Winn?” Kara answers, but she doesn’t move away from Lena and when Lena tries to pull away, Kara’s hand at her hips stops her, her ankles hooking a bit at Lena’s calves. “She what?! When?!”

With only the benefit of one half of the conversation Lena can’t really track what’s happening but with the way Kara’s starting to tense again, a dark worried look on her voice, Lena can guess it has something to do with Alex.

They talk for a few minutes, Kara mostly listening and interjecting with increasingly surprised whats every so often until she hangs up with a heavy sigh.

“What happened?” Lena asks, worry putting a crease between her brows.

Kara just kind of stares at her phone a moment before up at Lena. “Alex got put on suspension,” she says. “She tried to beat up that guy we brought in.”

“What?!” Lena asks, shocked. Alex is – well she’s not a good soldier exactly – but she tends to always end up on the right side of protocol. She can’t imagine what kind of headspace she’d have to be in to go beating up on a suspect. “Is she okay?”

A tender look crosses Kara’s eyes before she nods. “It’s Alex. She’ll be fine.”

“Yeah, of course,” Lena says with a quirk of her lips. “I was thinking of heading back into the office for a bit anyway. Lana sent me some information I need to cross reference and I can’t access the files remotely.”

Kara hesitates a moment, looks like she’s going to say something – a protest about Lena going out by herself most likely – but seems to decide otherwise and just nods. “Okay, be careful,” is all she ends up saying, leaning over for a quick kiss.

“You too,” Lena whispers, tracking Kara’s lips forward to steal seconds. “Let me know about Alex.”

“I will.”

--

It takes a few weeks of research, but Lena finally finds a place suitable for what they need. They need seclusion, a space with plenty of room to roam, and she finds it after much scrutinizing of maps in their area. She waits to bring it up until one Sunday morning when Kara stays over after they watch a movie.

“Kara,” Lena whispers, nudging at her friend’s body and trying to ignore the warm feeling in her stomach when Kara noses into her shoulder and hums something. “Kara, I have a surprise for you.”

She watches as one of Kara’s eyes opens and the hand Kara’s got on Lena’s shirt runs up and down her ribcage, tapping a little.

“Is it cake?” Kara mumbles. Lena can’t help but laugh.

“No, it’s - that thing we talked about, a couple weeks ago,” Lena says. “I found a place for you to try out your powers.”

Kara freezes up a little, the hand on Lena’s side stalling in its slow movement as her face wakes up noticeably.

“You still want to do that?” Kara asks, her eyebrows coming together in confusion. Lena frowns in response and nods, and she can’t help but reach out and press a finger into the small crinkle on Kara’s face. Her face relaxes then and a small smile spreads on her face. “Okay. But - um-”

Lena laughs again, reading into the way Kara’s tongue flicks out against her lips and trying to ignore the flutter it pulls in her stomach. “We can stop at the bakery on the way.”

The smile widens at that, and Kara stretches full bodied on the bed in a way that Lena has to turn away from lest she act on the itch in her fingers to touch Kara intentionally.

They stop at Dinkel’s on the way there. Kara orders an obscenely large hot chocolate and six donuts for herself and gets Lena her usual latte order. It’s still a little cold out and the morning fog has yet to clear.

Kara slumps down in the passenger seat of Lena’s car, rolls the window down even with the chill of the outside and lets the breeze ruffle her hair.

Lena keeps the heat on low to fight the cold Kara’s invited into the car and glances at her friend. There’s something gorgeous about Kara in moments like these and Lena swallows against the hot rush of feeling she gets every time she acknowledges that truth. She has no space for that kind of feeling in her life.

They get as far as they can drive - Lena had intentionally picked a spot far from roadways - and they park the car in a secluded spot near a wooded area. Kara looks a little skeptical when Lena just starts walking into the lush forest area, but Lena holds her hand out entreatingly. “You can fly us next time,” she says with a quirk of her lips.

Kara seems to blush at that, but she takes Lena’s hand and squeezes it before following her into the trees. It was probably a mistake to tangle their fingers together - it’s doing nothing to help Lena ignore the growing feelings between them - but she can’t seem to correct it. It only gets worse when Lena stumbles over a tree root and Kara catches her easily, holding her upright in a strong and warm embrace.

When they arrive at the field, the tall grass there hits up around their knees, and the fog is still hovering over the space. The sun is just beginning to break through the haze, and Kara’s hair is starting to shine in the light. Lena adjusts her grip on the tablet she’s brought along to record data, and watches Kara breathe in the air for a moment too long.

“It’s nice,” Kara murmurs, closing her eyes against the early morning sunlight streaking across the field.

Lena lets her take it in for a few moments longer, waits for Kara to reopen her eyes and look at her.  

“Well,” Lena says, taking a breath and gesturing with her hand out to the field.

Kara just looks at her, looking uncertain. “Well what?”

Lena shrugs. “Do something.”

Adjusting her glasses, Kara continues to look unsure and Lena sighs. “Okay, let’s start easy,” she says and she moves forward until she’s in front of Kara. Slowly, she reaches up to tug the glasses off Kara’s face.

It’s odd how different Kara manages to look without them and she takes a second to study her friend’s face. Lena tucks the glasses into the pocket of her sweatshirt.

They stare at each other for a long moment, Lena feels something heat up – probably her cheeks – and she tries to curb the rolling attraction she keeps getting whenever she’s this close to Kara. With a soft clearing of her throat, she steps to the side and points at a tree not too far from them.

“Heat vision,” Lena says. “Can you do that?”

Kara glances over, looking nervous, but the look fades as she takes a deep breath and steadies herself. “I can try,” she says. Lena nods, and watches as the space around Kara’s eyes starts to turn a steady orange color. It’s a bit crazy to witness. As soon as it starts, though, Kara blinks and the orange is gone.

Immediately, Kara starts pacing back and forth in front of Lena at a speed that almost makes her look like a blur before she stops suddenly. The look of determination on her face is almost adorable, and the orange glow starts up again as she squints toward the tree - but it stops all the same. Kara resumes pacing.

“Kara,” Lena says, and Kara stops short, looking at Lena with wide eyes. “Are you okay?”

“I just - I’ve never - I haven’t used my powers in a long time,” Kara says. “There was this whole thing with - it doesn’t matter, I just haven’t - and you’re - ”

“It’s just me,” Lena says, and Kara rolls her eyes, spins around in a circle that seems a bit overdramatic.

“As if you are ever just you,” Kara says, her voice sarcastic. Lena tries to ignore the way the sentence makes her feel.

“Well, I don’t know,” Lena says, shrugging helplessly. “I don’t know how to coach you, Kara. Just...focus. Find something and focus on it.”

“Focus,” Kara mutters, pacing more slowly before she stops and looks at Lena again. She nods, almost to herself, and turns back to the tree. “Focus.”

It takes a moment, but the orange around her eyes comes back, and Lena watches as Kara’s posture shifts, her hands clenching at her side. The bright beam of blue energy that bursts from her eyes seems to shock them both, and they both stare as one of the tree’s limbs hits the ground with a loud crack. The fog billows up to swallow it and a few birds scatter from the remaining branches.

“You did it,” Lena says, excitement bursting through her as Kara’s eyes return back to normal. Kara starts hopping up and down, letting out loud yelps.

“I did it!” Kara says, and she comes toward Lena so fast that Lena can’t get her arms up to receive Kara’s hug in time. She’s still jumping, and Lena can’t help but laugh and bury her head at Kara’s shoulder.

By the time she pulls her head away, she realizes they’re off the ground and are staying off the ground by a solid three feet.

“Kara,” Lena says, her fingers tightening on Kara’s arms. The other girl hasn’t seemed to notice what she’s done, is just smiling happily down at Lena. “Kara. We’re floating.”

“What?” Kara asks, and she looks down. The alarm that crosses her face clearly breaks her concentration, because Lena finds herself crashing down into Kara’s body heavily seconds later. Kara holds tight to her in what is probably an attempt to not jostle her, but it’s still something like landing on concrete.

“Ow,” Lena mutters, dropping her head down to Kara’s shoulder again and laughing when Kara starts spouting off an increasingly panicked series of apologies, then an increasingly annoyed series of requests to stop laughing.

--

L Corp is quiet when she arrives – just late enough that most of the workforce has headed home, but not late enough that the building is empty.

In fact, Alana is at her desk when Lena walks in and she looks up in surprise, standing quickly to greet her. “Miss Luthor. What are you – I mean what can I do for you?”

“It’s good you’re here actually,” she says, slightly grateful she took the time to change into a pair of slacks and a nice blouse from the soft comfortable clothes she had on before. “I could use your help.”

“Of course,” Alana says, following Lena into her office.

Lena strides behind her desk and drops her bag there, opening up the laptop still on her desk and booting it with quick keystrokes. “Can you get me the annual budget report for last year?”

When no answer is immediately forthcoming, she looks up with a quirk of her brow to see Alana just standing there, a slight crease in her forehead as if she didn’t understand Lena’s question.

“Problem?” Lena asks and that seems to startle Alana back to the present.

“No, sorry, Miss Luthor,” she says, straightening and turning to leave.

“Oh, and Alana?” Lena adds, opening a program on her computer and pulling her desk chair close. “I’d also like to see the Board minutes for the years 2015 through 2016.”

“What for?” Alana asks and when Lena sends her a surprised look at being question she seems to hear what she said. “I mean, I’m sorry, I’ll get those for you right away.”

Alana exits the office and Lena pulls up the list of Luthor Corp owned facilities Lana had complied earlier. One of them keeps standing out to her – the naval research facility Lex had built, but had been shut down nearly a decade ago.

There are a few others that hold some promise and she marks them down on a list. On the television she has mounted to her wall she pulls up a picture of the research facility – its blueprints and location.

Alana returns after a few moments with a folder and hands it to her. “The budget, Miss Luthor.”

“Thank you,” Lena says, flipping through the budget to find what she’s looking for. And there it is, a line in the budget set aside for expenses related to the facility. A facility that shut down years ago. “Odd,” she murmurs.

“Your brother’s naval research facility?” Alana asks, eyes on the picture displayed on Lena’s screen.

Lena tracks the gaze with a quirked brow, unable to interpret the look on Alana’s face. “I wouldn’t think you would recognize it,” Lena says slowly, starting to put pieces together of a puzzle she’s not sure she wants to finish. “You had to be pretty young when it shut down.” Lena laughs. “I certainly was.”

Alana shrugs, plays with her fingers and puts on a polite smile. “I make it a point to know as much as I can about Luthor Corp past and present. That’s my job, right?”

It’s a practiced answer if Lena’s ever heard one and eyes Alana skeptically for a moment before shaking the feeling away. She’s just paranoid as a result of everything that’s happened in the last few days – few months really. “Well for whatever reason L Corp is still footing a bill for the building,” Lena says, gesturing at the picture of the research facility. “In fact, there was a metal shipment there just last month.”

Lena stands, walks over to look at the building in the picture. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

Alana steps forward from behind her. “Accounting did just switch operating systems. Could be a glitch.”

“I suppose,” Lena says, stepping away and settling back at her desk. “You can head home for the night, Alana. I won’t be here much longer.”

With only a twitch of hesitation, Alana smiles and turns to leave.

For the next hour or so Lena slogs through budget reports and board minutes, cross referencing accounting tables with the list of possible locations Lana had sent her earlier. It’s a tedious task, but she knows the answer is somewhere here in the numbers.  

After double checking and then triple checking her hunch - a call to Lana to confirm a suspicion and another down to accounting - she calls Kara. The last thing she wants to do is send anyone on a wild goose chase.

Kara picks up after only a few rings. “Hey, you still at the office?”

“Yeah,” Lena says, shuffling through the papers on her desk and pulling out the address of the facility. Holding the paper in her hand, she stands. “How did it go with Alex?”

A defeated sigh says it all. “Not great. I’m worried she’s going to go do something reckless.”

“Maybe I can help with that,” she says. “I think I found something.”

“Yeah?” Kara sounds hopeful then and a renewed sense of purpose thrums happily along Lena’s skin.

“There’s an old Luthor Corp facility that’s supposed to be defunct, but-“ Suddenly the door to her office is opening and two men in black suits stride in. The words choke out of her mouth and she hears Kara say her name with growing concern at the silence.

Without thinking much about it she drops her cell phone on the desk and reaches into her purse for a rarely used taser she keeps there – ironically a gift from Lex years ago. “Stay back,” she warns them, holding the weapon up in front of her defensively, but they’re undeterred.

Distantly she can hear Kara’s voice shout out from her phone still holding the connection on the desk. She just needs to buy some time.

The first guy rushes her and she manages to hit him in the neck with her taser, the weapon vibrating intensely in her hand as it connects with flesh. But the second guy is coming for her and there’s not much room to retreat. The balcony door is to her back and she steps outside – just buy time, she tells herself.  

The first guy is already recovered and back on his feet and the second guy gets his hands on Lena, clearly trying to disarm her. It turns into a struggle, but she knows she’s not strong enough to overpower both of them.

“Don’t make this hard,” he growls at her and her back suddenly hits the rim of the small ledge around her balcony.

She resists his grip as it tugs her back towards the office and suddenly before she can even realize it, she’s actually managing to pull away. It’s so surprising and with so much force that it topples her balance, her entire body pushing backwards, up and over the balcony into open air.

And then she’s falling.

Before she can even process that she’s about to fall to her death a pair of familiar strong arms are catching her, flying down with her trajectory to cradle her into a hold.

“Can’t leave you alone for a minute,” Kara murmurs, her hair windswept and cheeks flushed.

Lena lets the intense pounding of her heart calm and laughs softly as Kara flies them back up towards her balcony.

The two men are still standing there, looking wide eyed as Lena and Kara come into view and Kara just glares at them. “Drop something?”

Both of them just look stunned and Kara takes in a deep breath before letting it out in a frosty chill. The force of it pushes them to the side where they roll unconscious onto the small balcony and Kara sets Lena back on the ground softly.

Without hesitation, Kara moves – stomps really – towards the two men with danger blazing in her expression, but Lena stops her swiftly lest she do something she regrets.

“Leave it,” Lena says, fingers wrapping around Kara’s wrist.

“I am really sick of people trying to kill you,” Kara grits out through a tense jaw, but she obeys the tug of Lena’s fingers and halts.

“It’s a good thing,” Lena says and Kara’s expression goes incredulous.

“In what universe is that a good thing?!”

“It means I was on the right track,” Lena points out, having realized just as much the second the two men entered her office. “I think I know where Cadmus is taking the missing aliens.”

“You do?” A renewed sense of purpose takes over Kara’s face and Lena bathes in the warmth of it.

“I do,” she says, stepping back inside her office and pulling a flash drive out of her laptop. “I put the details on here.”

Kara takes the small device and tucks it into the neckline of her suit. “Great, I’ll head to the DEO.” But instead of leaving like Lena half-expects, Kara wavers, turns a wary eye to the two unconscious bodies slumped on Lena’s balcony. She looks back at Lena and Lena can guess pretty easily what conversation they’re about to have.

“I’m fine,” Lena says, heading the argument off. “I can clean up here as long as you take care of them.”

“Lena,” Kara says warningly.

“I have an assistant to fire after all. If she hasn’t wisely fled the scene already.” She sends a hint of a glare for her office door, though she’s sure Alana is long gone.

“Why don’t I take you to Alex’s?”

“Alex’s?!”

“Yeah,” Kara says, hands on her hips in a clear signal that she’s not going to take no for an answer. “You can keep an eye on her for me. I told you I’m worried she’s going to do something crazy.”

With a narrowing of her eyes, Lena crosses her arms and considers. “You’re not trying to whisk me away to safety far away from the danger?”

“If I wanted that would I really send you to Alex?” Kara says and even though Lena’s sure that’s exactly where Kara would send her - the safest place Kara knows - she can see the tenuous lines of Kara’s face where she’s likely just barely holding on to her nerves.

So she relents. “Okay. To Alex’s apartment it is.”

“Great,” Kara says and without further ado steps forward and sweeps Lena up into a familiar hold. “I can drop you off.”

Lena barely has time to grab her bag from the desk before Kara’s taking them back out onto the balcony and then up, up and away.

--

The outside of Alex’s building is calm - night having settled long ago on National City. It’s a strange dissonance to the adrenaline of the last hour, but it’s nice when Kara sets Lena down on the sidewalk.

After making Lena promise about six times that she’ll head straight up to Alex’s apartment, Kara is zooming back to L Corp to dispose of the Cadmus agents and then to the DEO to deliver Lena’s information.

Lena heads up to Alex’s apartment - a place she’s only been a handful of times - and realizes far too late that she forgot to make sure Kara told Alex she was coming. Oh well. Too late to back out now.

It takes four knocks on the door for Alex to answer - tense seconds where Lena thinks maybe Alex isn’t home and has already left to do that reckless thing Kara was so worried about. But just as she’s about to call Kara and tell her just that, the door swings open to reveal Alex.

Alex dressed like she’s ready to go out in her leather jacket and boots – a gun strapped to her thigh. She looks behind Lena in suspicion. “Lena? What are you doing here?”

“Are you heading out?” Lena asks, gesturing to her jacket, but then a glance behind Alex shows the kitchen table - the one she’s sat at over dinners with Alex and Kara and Maggie - overflowing with a spread of weapons. “Alex, what are you doing?”

It’s fairly obvious to Lena what Alex might be doing and without waiting for an invitation, she steps into the apartment. With a touch of surprise, Alex doesn’t stop her, just moves aside and closes the door behind them. “Where’s Kara?”

“The DEO,” Lena answers, walking up to the table and reaching out to pick up what looks like a grenade. Alex snatches it from her hand immediately with a glower.

“Don’t touch that.”

“Tell me you’re just cleaning out your weapons cache because you’re bored,” Lena says, realizing that Kara was right - Alex is about to do something reckless and Lena’s the only one standing in her way.

“It’s nothing,” Alex says, putting a bag on the counter and starting to load it with items from the table. It certainly looks like something. “What are you doing here?”

“Kara sent me,” Lena answers, watching Alex’s movements carefully. “A couple of Cadmus agents threw me off a balcony.”

That information makes Alex still, her hand hovered inside her bag as she picks her eyes up to Lena’s face. “What? Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Lena says, with a shrug and shake of her head. Near death experiences are starting to become old hat to her. “Kara took care of it.”

Alex nods and then resumes what she had been doing. “And she sent you here because…”

“She thinks you’re going to do something reckless,” Lena says and then arches a pointed brow. “Which is exactly what it looks like you’re doing.”

“More like she sent you here so we could babysit each other,” Alex says. “She’s being overprotective.”

“She’s worried about you,” Lena says, watching as Alex tosses yet more explosives into the duffel bag in front of her. “Alex, whatever you’re planning on doing, I’m sure it’s not something you should be doing alone.” A thought occurs to her. “Where’s Maggie?”

Surely if Alex were planning on jumping into the lion’s den she’d think to bring her battle tested cop girlfriend.

“I don’t want to involve her in this if I don’t have to,” Alex answers. “It’s dangerous.”

A beat of silence. Lena observes Alex for a moment and then makes a decision. “I’m calling Kara,” she says, but before she can even unlock her phone, Alex’s hand is darting out and plucking it from her hands. “Alex,” she says with clearly warning, narrowed eyes, tight jaw.

Alex just shakes her head. “Lena, I have to do this. You can’t call Kara.”

“This is ridiculous,” Lena says, blinking incredulously at Alex. Her fingers reach to the watch on her wrist. A phone call isn’t the only way she has to reach Kara and Alex follows the motion with her eyes, understanding clear on her face.

“Don’t,” Alex says, her hand outstretched towards Lena. “Please.”

It’s the please that makes Lena hesitate. The expression on Alex’s face is impossibly complicated.

“Alex,” Lena says again, this time on a sigh. She doesn’t know what to do, but Alex takes a deep breath.

“It’s my dad, Lena,” Alex says in this soft, vulnerable voice that Lena doesn’t know how to react to. A memory surfaces then, of Alex's words when she had asked Lena to help find Jeremiah - If anyone can understand this grey area, it's you. It feels like that moment was years ago from where they stand now. They lock eyes and a tension threads its way between them. It doesn’t make her want to press the button on her watch any less, but Alex keeps talking.

“He’s on our side. I know he is,” she says. “And if the DEO finds him, they’re not going to give him the benefit of the doubt. J’onn declared him a hostile fugitive.”

Lena’s not sure where to start with all of that information so she tackles the first thing she thinks of. “I don’t know what to say about trusting a man that just a few days ago proved how untrustworthy he is,” she says, not deterred by the narrowing of Alex’s eyes or the frustrated way she crosses her arms over her chest. “I spent a night with Winn picking up pieces of the DEO’s mainframe because your father took an automatic rifle to it after stealing the registry for Cadmus so they could –“

“He didn’t have a choice,” Alex interrupts and Lena huffs in disbelief.

“There’s always a choice.”

“He has his reasons. I have to believe that,” Alex continues. “I get why you don’t trust him, but that doesn’t mean I’m not going to.”

“You’re not thinking clearly,” Lena tries. “Kara said you beat a prisoner and now you’re loading a bag full of weapons and-“

Alex scoffs, turns back to grab a magazine of ammo and tuck it into a side pocket of her backpack. “I hardly needed to beat Griggs considering Kara nearly killed him with one punch,” she says and then looks pointedly Lena. “And I think we all know why. Talk about not thinking clearly.”

“That was different,” Lena says in a low voice, knowing how lame that sounds as soon as she says it.

“Was it?” Alex challenges, straightening and looking Lena dead on. “Because it seems to me like Kara was protecting her family. No matter the consequences. Just like I’m trying to do.”

Lena passes a frustrated hand over her face, sighs in the face of Danvers stubbornness. Alex just stares at her, expression conveying unwavering determination. “Do you even have a plan?” Lena asks wearily, already scrambling to figure out how she’s going to tell Kara about this when it’s all said and done.

Alex shrugs a shoulder, turns back to the arsenal of weapons on the table and grabs an extra handgun to tuck in her bag. “I know where Cadmus is taking the abducted aliens. I’m going to go there and-“

“You do?!” Lena interrupts, a bit shocked at the information. How did Alex find out?

The surprise in her voice pulls Alex’s gaze back up just as she finishes stuffing her bag and zipping it up. “Yes,” Alex says in a slow wary tone.

“But I know where Cadmus is,” she says uselessly and Alex’s brow furrows.

“The research facility?” Alex asks as if to confirm for herself and Lena nods. Alex holds her gaze a few more moments before nodding definitively. “Good. I have to get to my father before the DEO does.”

“I’m coming with you,” Lena says before she’s even finishing making the decision. It’s half because she sure as hell isn’t going to let Alex go alone – not when Kara is already so worried she’s going to do something exactly like this – and half because a deep part of her wants nothing more than to confront her mother.

Alex just laughs - a loud incredulous sound as slings her bag over her shoulder. “You are not.”

“I am,” Lena says and she holds her wrist out, pressing the button on her watch that flips the face open and holding it like a weapon in front of her. “Unless you want me to tell Kara what you’re up to.”

Alex’s eyes flash, jaw tightening. “You can’t. I have to do this.”

“Then you have to take me with you,” Lena says, letting her chest expand and eyes go serious. “I’m not letting you go alone. And if I tell Kara, you know she’ll stop you.”

“You don’t understand, Lena,” Alex says vehemently, coming around the table until they’re face to face. “This isn’t just about the abducted aliens.”

Lena locks her gaze with Alex for an intense moment. “If anyone understands that, Alex. It’s me.”

Alex’s eyes dart back and forth, the lines of her face tense as she clearly considers her options. With an aggravated exhale, she seems to relent, reaching over to grab a gun from the table and hold it out to Lena. “Fine,” she says and then look Lena up and down. “But we’re not storming the castle with you in those heels.”

Grabbing the gun and glancing down at the pair of black heels on her feet, Lena lets out a little laugh. “You’d be surprised what I can do in these,” she says, but Alex is already rolling her eyes and heading back into the apartment towards her bedroom.

--

After a string of incidents around campus, the entire student body is forced to undertake a week-long self-defense seminar. Lena feels largely unconcerned with this news, apart from the inconvenience of having to schedule around classes, but Kara expresses an anxiety about it that Lena has no idea what to do with.

“Someone’s going to notice,” Kara eventually confesses, buried under the sheets of Lena’s bed and looking timid.

“Going to notice what?” Lena asks, perplexed by the words.

“That I’m, you know,” Kara gestures vaguely, pulling Lena’s brows together in further confusion.

“Use your words,” she instructs with an encouraging smile and Kara sighs.

No more words are forthcoming, but Kara reaches out, slides a hand under Lena’s hip and abruptly lifts her a few inches off the mattress without looking strained by the motion in the slightest.

Lena lets out a surprised squeak at the movement and it causes Kara to set her back down rather quickly, but realization dawns her as her indignation fades. “I see.”

“Someone’s going to notice,” Kara repeats in a hushed whisper like if she says it too loud someone might overhear them.

The truth of what Kara’s saying is obvious – there’s little way Kara’d be able to successfully hide her powers in the middle of a sparring session. The second someone accidentally hits her or if Kara doesn’t read a movement correctly, game over.

Her silence seems to ratchet Kara’s anxiety up further and when blue eyes go comically wide, Lena reaches out to soothe her with a stroke of her palm. “You’ll be fine,” she says softly, but Kara clearly doesn’t buy it. Not that Lena blames her entirely.

“Maybe I can get a sick note or something,” Kara suggests, eyes darting around as she tries to solve the problem.

“They’ll just make you retake it,” Lena says and then a thought occurs to her. “But we’ll just make sure we go together.”

“How does that help?!”

“I already know about you,” Lena tells her. “So, we can go through the moves without giving anything away.”

“That isn’t better,” Kara says, looking slightly incredulous. “What if I accidentally punch you in the face or something?”

“It’s not like there’s a lot of punching in a basic self-defense class,” Lena laughs though Kara doesn’t look very reassured. Switching tactics, Lena shifts closer to Kara and presses her fingers into Kara’s stomach, slides them up under the warmth of her sleep shirt in a soothing gesture. “I trust you,” she says softly, trying to erased the panicked look in Kara’s eyes. “You know that.”

It mimics a conversation they’d been having for what feels like the last month. Kara’s worry over accidentally hurting Lena a hurdle they’d been attempting to overcome slowly but surely.

“I know you do,” Kara sighs. “But maybe you shouldn’t.”

Lena rolls her eyes at how circular their conversations have started to feel in this context, but instead of arguing, she just moves her body until she’s practically crawling on top of Kara. Kara rolls over to her back as Lena does it, hands moving automatically to Lena’s side to keep her steady.

“Maybe you should trust me more,” Lena says softly, her hips slotting down against Kara’s.

“I do trust you,” Kara insists, her hands sliding from Lena’s side to the small of her back, intention starting to swirl between them with the way their bodies press fully against each other.

“Remember when you didn’t want to touch me?” Lena points out and she reaches behind herself to push Kara’s hand up under her own shirt until it’s warming bare skin.

Kara swallows visibly, but doesn’t move her hand. “That’s not exactly what happened,” she says with a pointed look as her palm trails downward. Lena laughs.  

“We got through that,” Lena continues. “Because you trusted me, right? And was I wrong?”

Blue eyes dart down to Lena’s lips, a little distracted, but Kara shakes her head. “No, you weren’t.”  

“So trust me,” Lena murmurs hovered over Kara’s mouth.

“Okay,” Kara whispers just before she pushes upward and kisses Lena hotly, her hold on Lena’s waist tightening as she rolls them over and pushes Lena down into the mattress.

A week later, Lena meets Kara outside her Acting for Non-Majors class wearing yoga pants and a sweatshirt of Kara’s. They amble their way toward the student union where the self-defense classes are being held, and Kara rambles on and on about the strange acting exercise they did in class.

“And apparently the imaginary ball could change size and we had to pass it to each other in different ways,” Kara says. “I don’t really understand what it has to do with acting.”

“Darling, it has nothing to do with acting,” Lena says. “Your professor is insane.”

“Tippi is not insane!” Kara says, with some indignation, but there’s a smile on her face as she swings Lena’s hand back and forth. When they make it to the room and check in, though, Lena can see the anxiety start to leak through. The self-defense instructor is a tall woman with bright blonde hair - the classes are split along traditional gender lines - and she seems relatively unconcerned with the largely disengaged students who have shuffled their way into the room.

“So, I see most of you are in pairs, that’s awesome,” she says cheerfully. “Everybody stand up, let’s get limber and then we’ll go through the basics!”

They find a spot in the corner of the class, relatively shielded from the rest of the students - not that anyone is paying them any mind.

“What did you do in gym class in high school?” Lena asks quietly, mostly out of curiosity, leaning down to touch her toes and eyeing Kara as she stands there and attempts to look like she’s stretching. She isn’t; she’s mostly staring at Lena’s legs. When she clears her throat, Kara blinks and her face flushes.

“Um, I had asthma,” Kara says. “And since Eliza and Jeremiah were doctors, no one ever tested it. I went to class for a week and I shattered a uh - the thing in basketball.”

“A backboard,” Lena offers, and Kara nods, her eyes darting around the room before they reattach themselves to Lena. “Were you always a leg girl? Or am I just special?”