241. Chapter 241

She shrugs it off and she brings home pizza and she smiles as Maggie fawns over the scrape on her wrapped arm, as Maggie presses soft kisses all around her bandage, as she dotes on her girl even as Alex insists, insists, that she’s fine, that it’s just a scratch, that it was no big deal, really.

But she secretly loves the attention Maggie is giving her, the big deal Maggie is making; how strong, how heroic, Maggie is making her feel.

Maggie knows. She lays it on extra thick, because Alex has spent enough time neglecting herself – enough time being neglected – enough time in the shadow of other heroes, of other injuries, to have hers attended to, to have hers honored.

But in the morning?

In the morning, they both realize that she wasn’t fawning over just a scratch.

Because in the morning, Alex is burning up and Alex is dry heaving and Alex’s temperature is rising by the minute.

Maggie calls Kara with the phone balanced on her shoulder as she half drags, half carries Alex into the shower, stripping her drenched clothes to run her body under cool water, to try, to try, to lower her temperature. To try to keep her somewhat stable until Kara can get her medics that will know what the hell alien poisons are.

The DEO’s med bay was trashed in the attack the night before, so for a moment, Kara panics. But only for a moment.

“Cisco,” she calls into the communicator he gave her. “I need you. Now.”

Maggie knows better by now than to be shocked when a swirling blue vortex appears behind her in Alex’s bathroom.

“Flash,” Alex giggles vaguely as her head lolls loosely onto Maggie’s shoulder. “Bastard took Kara. Dangerous. Without me. Need words with him.”

“Shh, that’s right, Ally,” Maggie whispers, looking askance into the vortex as Kara lands in the bathroom door, ignoring the vortex all together as she rushes toward the shower.

“What the hell happened?” she asks Maggie, grabbing a towel to wrap her sister in, switching off the water as she kneels over her. “It’s okay Alex. I’m here, I’m here. I’ve got you.”

“Kara,” Alex babbles. “Flash vortex.”

“That’s right, Alex. Star Labs is going to help you.” She glances at Maggie. “It’s gotta be an infection from that scratch last night.”

Maggie nods, and her eyes are wide as she watches her girlfriend slip in and out of consciousness. She barely notices when two men appear in the bathroom behind them, breathing slightly heavily, the one with the strange goggle-glasses with his hand on his chest and a vague grin on his face.

“Only took one try this time! My man, we’re getting better at this!” He holds up his hand for the man in red to hit, but the Flash leaves him hanging as he goes to kneel next to Kara.

“This isn’t how I wanted to see you again. Or how I wanted to meet your sister.”

“Thanks for coming, Barry.” Kara gives him a sideways hug as he looks down at Alex’s drenched body.

“Hey, secret identity,” the other man murmurs, but Kara waves him off.

“Maggie’s family, Cisco.”

Maggie glances up at him – at Cisco – and grimaces a greeting, too numb with fear to fully register the impact of Kara’s words.

“Looks like an infection, obviously, but metas aren’t exactly like aliens, so I don’t… Come on,” Barry tells Kara. “We have to get her back through the vortex. Caitlin’ll come up with something, Kara. I promise.”

Kara nods grimly and picks up Alex’s limp body in her arms like she weighs nothing. Barry gingerly positions the towel more completely around Alex’s body while somehow averting his eyes from her nakedness at the same time, and Maggie immediately decides she likes this Flash character.

She rises to follow Kara into the vortex, and they all look at her and hesitate.

“It’s a parallel earth, Maggie. It’s not… the more people we take over, the bigger the risk of – ”

“Look, I know you don’t know me, and I know you have this big superhero system on your earth, and I know you have super speed and you have some vibing shit, but I swear it doesn’t matter what superpowers you both have. She’s my girlfriend and I am not leaving her side.”

Barry stares for a moment and then nods grimly, once, while a broad smile grows on Cisco’s face. “Dude, she gay?” he asks Kara. “Nice work!” He grins down at Alex’s unconscious form, and sobers immediately. “I guess I’ll… congratulate her when she comes to.”

Kara rolls her eyes and Maggie grins faintly at Cisco’s enthusiasm for queerness, at his persistent belief, his obvious faith in this Caitlin person to save Alex, the way his eyes grow somber and focused and intense as he turns back to reopen the vortex.

“Nothing bad’s gonna happen to your girlfriend, Maggie. We’re not gonna allow it.”

He reaches back for her hand and squeezes slightly before he opens the vortex, and Maggie gulps her appreciation, because her throat is too constricted to allow for any more words.

“Kara,” a beautiful white girl rushes forward when they step through the vortex. “Lay her right here.”

Kara obeys and the woman – “Caitlin Snow. Best doctor on this or any earth. She’ll fix your girl. I promise,” Cisco leans in and whispers to Maggie – slips into mode immediately, with an intensity of focus Maggie has seen in Alex so many times, both in the field and in the bedroom.

“Do we know anything about the species that gave her the wound?” Caitlin is streaming through questions with Kara, with Maggie, as she checks Alex’s vitals, as she drapes a medical gown over her body, as she makes notes to herself and exchanges significant glances with a concerned-looking Barry.

Kara and Maggie are fielding answers as best they can when two more people burst into the lab, one in a yellow suit that almost matches Barry’s and one in a pair of jeans that would have Maggie gulping under other circumstances.

The woman with the jeans falls into Barry’s arms after pulling Kara into a long hug. “Are you alright? I know what it’s like to watch a sibling in danger,” she says, shoving the boy who ran in with her gently.

“I trust Caitlin,” Kara says softly, but her eyes are wide and her eyes are terrified.

“Iris West, and my brother, Wally. Kid Flash,” the woman holds her hand out to Maggie. “You’re Alex’s girlfriend.”

Barry, Wally, and Cisco all turn to stare at Iris, and even Caitlin glances up with an arched eyebrow.

Iris shrugs. “Journalist. Also, I know a little something about watching your unconscious superhero partner get prodded and poked on a medical table: I know that look.”

She nods her head toward Barry, but her warm eyes don’t leave Maggie’s.

“Maggie Sawyer, NCPD,” Maggie recites automatically, and Kara reaches out and squeezes the hand that Iris doesn’t have.

Iris offers Maggie a small smile. “My dad’s a cop, too. He’d approve of you for someone as amazing as we’ve heard Kara’s sister is.”

Maggie gulps and her hand clenches Iris’s harder without meaning to. “Caitlin’s the best. Alex is gonna be okay.”

“Alex is gonna kill Barry for letting Kara go fight an army of aliens without her alien-fighting sister,” a ragged, exhausted voice croaks from the medical table.

“Alex!” Maggie and Kara both exclaim, and Caitlin smiles as she steps back from the table to allow Alex’s family to surround her.

“Babe, I’m here,” and “Alex, I’ve got you,” accompany “Damn, Caitlin, alien infections stand no chance against you!” and “It was simple, really, and important that Maggie got Alex’s temperature down as fast as she did” and “Told you Caitlin’s the bomb” and “Please no bomb references, not after last week” and “Should I leave before she comes to fully? Because I really think she might make good on her threats to kill me for bringing Kara over here without her” and “Run Barry, run.”

And Star Labs had never been quite so full of superheroes, or quite so full of relief, or quite so full of love across earths.