Chapter 25
Two years later
A knock sounded on her door and Kara glanced away from the movie playing on the TV and the containers of Chinese takeout on her coffee table to peer through the door. She scrambled out of her seat when she saw who was waiting on the other side, and rushed to open the door. “Carter, buddy, what are you doing here?” Kara asked as the teenager trooped into her house passed her.
“I’m here for dinner,” Carter replied. “Hi Krypto,” he greeted the black dog that had wandered over to sniff at him when he walked through the door. Krypto woofed out a greeting, nosing the boy for a minute before returning to his plush bed wedged in between the couch and one of the chairs.
The previous year, Kara decided she was going to raid her cousin’s fortress of solitude. It was a piece of Krypton on Earth, a sanctuary created for Kal-El by his father Jor-El, that’s what he was told anyway. Truthfully the technology was something both her father and her uncle were working on, so she had as much right to it as her cousin. She knew it was in the Antarctic, Diana had told her that much when she was staying with her, but she hadn’t ever tried to look for it. Kara contacted the Amazonian who met her in Gotham, and the two of them plus Kate, who needed a distraction after breaking up with Maggie, took the invisible jet down to the ice cliffs in Antarctica.
She located her pod in the fortress and inside of it was a message left from her mother, the only thing she really had from her, and an AI device similar to the one Jor-El had left for his son of him. She didn’t think she would ever be able to forgive Clark for withholding something of hers, something that her mother left for her. Deeper in the fortress, Kara found Krypto, the shapeshifting dog that her father had gotten for her eleventh birthday, frozen in a stasis chamber.
Kara was nearly apocalyptic when she found a memo from Jor-El that he had gotten the dog as a puppy for his son, cursing her uncle back to Rao for such dishonesty. She freed her pet and Kate took him back to Gotham with her while they waited to see if he had any special powers like she and her cousin since he was a Kryptonian life form. It took months for them to train Krypto to control his powers enough for him to come live with Kara in her apartment without bringing down the building. Fortunately Krypto was intelligent and caught on quickly, though he did use that time period to switch between different dog breeds before finally settling on a black Belgian shepherd. Occasionally he did shift into a great Pyrenees, but never when they were going out in public.
“Aren’t you supposed to be at your dad’s while mom is out of town?” She continued, reclaiming her seat on the couch near Krypto. She dropped a few treats for the dog and turned the TV on mute while she glanced at her little brother as he perused through the containers of food she left on the coffee table. “Um, excuse you, bud,” Kara lifted the table out of his reach so he would focus on her questions. “Focus, aren’t you supposed to be at your dad’s?”
Carter just shrugged, “I guess, he kept leaving me alone though, or sticking me with his new wife. You know she’s only like eight years older than me right? She was trying to be my mom, or ignoring me to play on her phone, so I left. I left my dad a note though so he won’t worry about me.”
“Doesn’t mean he’s not going to worry Carter, did you at least tell Mom you were coming to stay here?”
“Eh, I figured I would tell her tonight when she called,” the boy replied sheepishly, “I mean, she is in Geneva, and it is like the middle of the night there and I didn’t want to bother her.”
“Ugh, fine, but I’m not covering for you if Mom gets mad, remember she’s coming home in a few days, and will probably figure out a way to kill me if something happens to you,” Kara told him, handing him the container of sweet and sour chicken.
Carter scoffed, “Mom wouldn’t kill you, you know she loves you and you’re her favorite, other than me of course. Besides, you're an alien, how would she kill you?”
Kara smiled wryly at him, “She's resourceful, you'd know she'd find a way “
The boy conceded her point and dug into his food. “It's not like you have to do a lot of work to take care of me,” he said around the food in his mouth. “Take me to school, pick me up from soccer practice, or I can just catch the bus and come here. I can walk Krypto for you.”
At the sound of his name Krypto perked up and walked over to the boy, licking his hands and jumping up to lick at his face. “You're lucky that you don't shed,” Kara wheezed out as Krypto turned to collapse on her, curling up on her lap. “Mom would probably burn down the apartment if there was dog hair everywhere.”
Krypto just woofed and nuzzled into her. “I'm hoping if I prove to Mom that I can take care of a dog, that she'll let me get one. We can get a hypoallergenic dog, one that doesn't shed, maybe one of the doodles?”
“You know mom doesn't like dogs in her apartment, only reason Krypto is allowed is because he's trained and highly intelligent, and two, you know she doesn't like the doodles, calls them designer dog breeds.”
“What are the chances of finding another shape shifting Kryptonian dog?” He asked, playing with the tail that was wagging on the couch.
Kara gave him a sympathetic smile, “Sorry buddy.”
Carter sighed, “Guess I have to make do with Krypto then.” The dog wagged its tail some more and snuffled back over to the teenager, no doubt trying to disguise his attempts to steal the container of food out of his hand.
“No, Krypto,” Kara warned, a glint of steel in her voice. “You know you can’t eat people food, gives you gas.” She got up off the couch and snapped her fingers as she walked over to the kitchen. Krypto slid off the couch at her command and followed her, waiting patiently by his gigantic food dish as she filled it with a mixture of wet and dry dog food. When she finished and put away the food, Kara let him know that he could eat and Krypto attacked his food bowl with ferocity while Kara returned to the couch.
“See? You let me stay here, I can take care of Krypto while you’re busy at CatCo,” Carter continued, his eyes large and pleading.
“Fine, fine, you can stay, but you’re explaining to Mom about why you’re here.” When she finished speaking, Kara’s phone rang, and she glanced down to see her mother’s face appearing on the screen. “Perfect timing,” she muttered, answering the phone. “Hey Mom, Carter’s here and he has something to tell you.” She handed the phone off to the sulky teenager without waiting for the woman to say anything and grabbed another container of food off the coffee table.
She listened idly as Carter explained why he left his father’s and was now staying at her apartment with her and Krypto. When he finished he handed the phone back to her, and Kara walked up to her bedroom and shut the door to give her some privacy.
“Are you sure it’s okay that Carter is staying with you for a few days before I come home?” Cat’s voice came before she could say anything.
Kara sighed, “Mom, it’s fine, Carter has stayed here before on the weekend, it’s not a problem. If he wants to sleep on my couch for a few days, that’s up to him.”
“Wasn’t Lena supposed to be staying with you sometime this week for a few days?”
“That’s not until the night you’re supposed to come home. I figured that I could bring Carter and pick you up at the airport and Lena could let herself into my apartment, you know, like she normally does.”
“You two have always had boundary issues. If I didn’t know better, I would have said you would’ve started dating years ago, but that’s not really the relationship you have. Besides, I think she’s very much interested in someone else…”
“What?” Kara asked, confused.
“Nevermind darling, how are things at CatCo?”
She resisted the urge to sigh again, “They’re fine, just as you left them and they’ll be fine when you get back in a few days. And I thought that we agreed not to discuss CatCo business during family time? It is the best way to separate work personalities from home life, public and private lives right?”
“Yes yes, sorry darling, it’s a habit.”
“Just remember that when you want something from your assistant, you usually text me,” Kara continued. “Though if you accidentally call me ‘Kiera’ during family time, I will never forgive you.”
“I would never ,” Cat replied indignantly.
The younger blonde just hummed, “Now tell me how your day was yesterday, what did you do?”
Kara leaned back against her bed as Cat started telling her about her day. She let her senses expand to check on Carter in the living room, noting that he had changed the channel to some creepy, gory horror movie, and she would have to change it before he ended up with nightmares or spin a tale to their mother that she had let him watch scary movies. Speeding to the living room, Kara took the remote and changed the channel to a nature documentary and was back in her room with the remote before Carter knew what had happened. She heard his groaning as she settled back on her bed, but quickly settled down to watch the documentary of life in the arctic during spring.
“Was he trying to watch a horror movie again? Cat asked having heard the whooshing sound of air moving and her son groaning loudly.
“Not anymore,” the blonde replied.
She heard Cat sigh through the phone, “He’s getting rather disobedient as of late, more on the outgoing side, mischievous. I blame you for this.”
“He’s never had a problem making friends,” Kara countered, “And the bullies don’t pick on him at school. I view that as a good thing.”
“Because you taught him a few of the moves you picked up from Kate and Diana.”
“Carter’s a little on the scrawny side, he needs all the help he can get.”
The older woman sighed again, “I suppose you’re right. Though I am grateful he took the news that you were an alien better than I thought he would. He was more disappointed that he wasn’t an alien, but I think his crush on you he had as a child came back full force. He looks up to you so much, I shouldn’t be surprised he wants to be just like you, or stays with you when his father continues to prove himself a waste of space.”
Kara giggled at little at her words, “You know if Carter hears you say he has a crush on me, his whole face turns red and his ears turn purple.”
“Amusing isn’t it?”
She was about to reply when Carter bellowed from the living room. “Kara! Can I give Krypto some ice cream?”
“No!” She called back immediately, “Don’t you even think about it Carter Henry Grant, you put that ice cream back in the freezer.” Kara narrowed her eyes as the teenager wavered between doing as she ordered and complying to the large, puppy-dog eyes staring up at him from her pet. “Sorry Mom, I’ve got to go before Carter gives Krypto people food and we have to fumigate the apartment.”
“He’s definitely not allowed a pet until he’s at least thirty,” Cat sighed. “Go take care of him, I’ll call you tomorrow with final details of my flight schedule. I love you Kara.”
“I love you too Mom,” Kara returned, clicking the phone off. She glanced back up just in time to see Carter hold a spoonful of ice cream over Krypto’s head and drop it. She’s pretty sure she reached lightspeed as she managed to catch the scoop of ice cream in a bowl before Krypto could devour it. “I don’t think so,” the blonde said, taking the ice cream and spoon away from her little brother.
“Awe, Kara, he clearly needs it,” Carter whined, pointing to the black dog looking up at them with large, sad brown eyes.
“I’m sure,” she muttered, turning a disapproving eye on her dog. “You should know better Krypto, you know that Carter is weak and can’t resist your sad eyes.” Krypto just woofed out lightly and Kara tisked, “Don’t try it with me, bed, go.” She pointed to the balcony where she installed a doggy door and a suitable dog house for him. He preferred to sleep outside when the weather was nice, feel the breeze blow through his fur, listen to the sounds of the city with his superior senses, even for a dog. Kara often wondered if it was his way of listening for threats, sleeping outside where they would come from, but she didn’t pay it much attention. Krypto was happy sleeping on the balcony at night when it wasn’t pouring down rain and that was all that mattered. “And you get to bed too Mister, you’ve got school tomorrow,” she said, turning back around to face Carter.
“Kara,” he pleaded, “Just a little longer…”
“You can finish the documentary, but then it’s bed for you,” Kara acquiesced. “Get ready for bed though while I get everything set up out here.”
Carter grabbed his bag and moved to the bathroom while Kara sped through the rest of her food and moved the coffee table out of the way. The couch didn’t completely fold out into a full sized bed, just a little bit so that it was the same size as a single bed. She tossed the takeout containers in the trash and checked the fridge to make sure she had enough food to feed herself and Carter in the morning. At the very least, she had fruit and his favorite cereal stocked for his breakfast, but she would need to grab some groceries if she was going to feed them both. Carter’s appetite was starting to resemble hers with how much he ate, though he didn’t eat as much of the protein and calorie dense food as she did, he just ended up eating a lot of junk.
“I don’t want to hear you complaining about having to get up in the morning since you wanted to stay up longer,” Kara told the boy when he came back out of the bathroom. “Someone has to walk Krypto and since you volunteered…”
“I won’t, I can do it!” He said, bouncing on the couch where Kara had tucked sheets around the cushions.
Kara returned the remote to one of the end tables, and went through her evening ritual as well, pulling her silk robe over her pajamas so as not to give Carter a heart attack. “I'll wake you up in the morning,” Kara told him, clicking off the lights in the living room though leaving on a small nightlight.
“Thanks Kara,” Carter said, turning a grateful eye on his sister. “And uh, thanks for letting me stay here, you know since I left my dad's place.”
The blonde smiled and pushed some of the tousled curls out of Carter's face before bending down to press a kiss on his forehead. “What are big sisters for?”
“Honey, I’m home!” Lena sang out as she blew through the front door, her raincoat still clutched tightly around her, water dripping off making large puddles on the floor. “What’s for dinner?”
Kara glanced at her friend in disbelief before looking at the clock on her coffee maker. “I thought you said you had a date tonight?” The blonde asked, setting the stove to simmer while she stepped away to greet the other woman. “Give me your coat, you’re making a mess.”
“It’s not my fault, it’s raining cats and dogs out there,” Lena said, wiggling out of the coat. Krypto perked up from his spot on the floor next to Carter and woofed over at the brunette. “Excuse me, not literally cats and dogs,” she amended and the dog came over to greet her before returning to his spot. Carter was working through his homework, a book report he needed to get done, so only grunted out a greeting to the woman.
“I could smell it in the air and I heard it coming from out over the ocean, but you dodged my question,” Kara commented after hanging the coat up in the bathroom. “I thought you had a date tonight?”
Lena sighed, “I did, but she had to leave early.”
“Was it another one that was prejudice against, you know…”
“No, surprisingly she didn’t mind. No, she was a doctor and had to leave because one of the patients had an emergency.” Lena settled onto one of the bar stools, and propped her chin up on her folded hands, “We didn’t even get to dinner, hence why I’m here.”
“Sorry Lee,” Kara replied, “Are you going to reschedule?”
“Eh,” the brunette shrugged, “Probably not. While she wasn’t bothered by my last name, she was incredibly boring. I know as a doctor she deals with a lot of stress and everything, but that god complex she had was so annoying and she was just… just boring.”
“You’ve been really picky about your dates recently,” the blonde mused. “They’ve either been too needy, too boring, not interesting enough, who is good enough for Lena Luthor anyway?”
Lena’s eyes darted towards the painting hanging over Kara’s bed in her bedroom before glancing back at her friend. “Mhm, I wonder,” she mused, causing her friend to glance at her curiously. “Nothing, nothing. What’s for dinner?”
“I have steak and chicken grilled and vegetable stir-fry on the stove, you can grab what you want I guess before Carter gets at it.”
“You and Carter you mean,” Lena teased.
Kara rolled her eyes, “I've already set aside the fatter pieces of meat for me. Oh and remember, don't give any food to Krypto.”
Lena make a disgusted face as her nose scrunched, “No worries about that, I remember what happened last time.”
“I warned you not to give into his face. I figured that out on Krypton, and assumed he would have the same problem with food that he did there.”
“Could’ve warned a girl,” Lena groused.
“I did!” Krypto woofed at the two of them, turning his head further into Carter as a way of sulking over the fact that they were talking about him. His species was highly intelligent, and could understand spoken language if they were around it enough, just lacked the proper vocal range to be able to speak it. Kara assumed that he could talk to other animals though since he was usually found conversing with a pair of squirrels in the park whenever they went, keeping other dogs away from the small animals.
“I’ll take a piece of steak please of masterchef,” Lena said, changing the conversation back to the food. Kara gestured over to her the tin foil covered plates on the counter and turned the heat off on the stove, plating the vegetables. She pushed a reasonable amount on Carter’s plate, more on Lena’s and then put the rest on her plate. Lena grabbed the piece of steak she wanted and Kara put another on Carter’s with a piece of chicken before placing the rest on a separate plate.
“Carter, dinner,” Kara called, putting the plate on the table in front of the boy.
“Thanks Kara,” he said, digging into his food.
She turned a disapproving eye on her dog before gesturing towards the kitchen. “Your dinner is in there, not out here.” He turned a look of betrayal at her as he longing looked at the steak and chicken on Carter’s plate before sulking into the kitchen and digging into his own food.
“I’m never getting a pet,” Lena sighed as she settled onto one side of the couch. “Or having kids, I can barely keep a plant alive.”
“Probably a wise decision,” Kara muttered as she dug into her own food.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means that I heard about what happened to that ‘egg baby’ you were supposed to look after in one of your science classes,” Kara replied. “You scrambled it.”
“It was over easy thank you very much,” the brunette said indignantly, poking at the alien lightly with her fork. “When does your mom’s plane get in?”
Kara glanced over at the clock, “Should be within the hour or so. Doesn’t take long to get to the airport and it’ll take her awhile to get through customs.”
“What was she in Geneva for?”
“She was covering some convention, had to do with alien life on the planet. I think she said something about having an invested interest in what they were discussing.”
“Mhm, I wonder why,” Lena muttered into her food and Kara nudged her softly with her elbow.
A breaking news bulletin sounded across the TV, breaking the three of them out of their discussions and causing them to look up at the screen. They saw images of a struggling plane soaring over National City, its engines on fire as it struggled to remain in the sky. “Oh god, you don't think that's…” Lena started and Kara whirled around, using her X-ray vision to look through walls and buildings.
She located the plane after a few minutes and found her mother sitting in first class, her hands clenched tightly around the arms of her seat. She could read both her and Carter's names being soundlessly mouthed like a mantra as the plane rattled in the sky. “Mom,” Kara whispered horrified, allowing her vision to return to the room.
“Kara you have to do something,” Carter stated horrified.
Before he even finished speaking, she had moved to the hall closet and was pulling a black and white National City Renegades sweatshirt over her tank top. Carter was a big fan of the city's women's soccer team and had gotten the sweatshirt for her so they could match when they went to the games. She pulled the hood over her head, pulling it low over her eyes but letting her hair hang freely on the side of her head. She had on a pair of blue yoga pants so she didn't worry too much about them being soaked from the rain. “I won’t let anything happen to Mom Carter,” Kara told her little brother before opening the balcony doors. She bolted out of the apartment faster than they could see and took off in the torrential downpour. She faltered slightly in the rain, it had been a while since she went flying outside in the elements, not since she was last Gotham over a year ago. Kate had left Gotham to travel the world in her yacht, tracking a group of criminals that fled Gotham since Batman could not. Kara did not get much time to go flying as her mother’s assistant, so she was out of practice.
Kara felt her gravitational field pulsing around her and she fell into a rhythm, shooting towards the falling plane. She grabbed onto the tail in hopes to slow it down but ended up being dragged by the falling plane. Growling out, Kara glanced around her searching for a place to safely land the plane since she wasn’t going to be able to get it back up in the sky. She twisted the tail fin and flew quickly towards the left wing to angle it back towards the airport, since it was the closest and safest place to land the plane. She looked up towards the plane and saw her mother looking back at her from first class, love, trust, and worry easily visible in her eyes.
Her efforts doubled and she flew under the plane to lift it up and away from the building as she continued to guide the falling plane. One of the engines suddenly broke off and Kara flew down to catch it, guiding it down on the ground before setting it down on the ground and taking off after the plane. Rain and wind stung at her eyes as she struggled with the large hunk of metal, a loud scream leaving her voice as she lifted, desperation driving her. She had already lost one mother and was helpless to stop it, she would not lose another, not like this.
It felt like hours, days before she finally spotted the airport just ahead of her. The pilots must’ve seen it too because the landing gear lowered, and all she had to do was slow the plane down. She moved, wrapping her arms around the tail of the plane and pushing backwards with her own gravity, only slightly slowing down. Kara hissed out in frustration and flew in front of the plane, digging her hands into the nose as she pushed against the metal with all of her strength. Feeling it crumple beneath her fingers, a desperate scream left her throat. “Shit, shit, shit, shit,” Kara yelled.
She jostled a little when the plane bounced on the ground, but held on firm, desperate to stop the speeding machine. Eventually she felt the plane slowing down and she pushed harder until it came to a complete stop. Nerves and fear filled her mind, causing her to expend more energy than was completely necessary, so she fell off the plane onto the ground. Kara heaved out, deep heavy breaths, blinking her eyes as rain continued to pelt down from the sky. She could hear sirens approaching and people clamoring in the plane as they snapped pictures of her and cried, all grateful to be alive.
Kara staggered to her feet and shot off into the sky, swirling high above the clouds to get out of the rain and make her way back to her apartment unseen. It only took a few minutes before she was flying through the balcony doors of her apartment and hugging her crying brother. “She’s okay,” she consoled him, “They’re all okay, I got the plane to land at the airport, everything’s fine.”
“She’s okay? She’s really okay?” Carter asked, tears still streaming down his face.
“I didn’t speak with her, but yes she seemed okay,” Kara murmured. She continued to hold the boy as he cried in relief until he exhausted himself. The blonde picked him up and settled him on the couch before moving over to where Lena was sitting out of the way on a barstool in the kitchen. She took the offered glass of wine and downed it in one gulp.
“Whoa girl, I know it doesn’t affect you but really you don’t have to gulp it down so fast,” Lena told her.
“It’s like a placebo effect,” Kara muttered, collapsing down on one of the stools. “I pretend it works so it calms me down.”
“Really, and does that work?” Lena asked, pouring her friend another glass of wine.
Kara took the glass and drank it down, clicking her tongue a little after she swallowed. “No,” she replied, “But it’s nice to pretend.” She slumped down on the counter, setting her head down on the cool marble. “I can’t believe I did that, I really did it.”
“Hell of a way to reveal yourself,” the brunette mused. “Fortunately you were all covered so you won’t have any issues there, but if you’re going to be a superhero, you really should use a mask.”
“I know, I know, Mom’s talked to me about that. It’s not like I had any time to prepare, this was an emergency.”
“Have you talked to Cat, do you need to pick her up?”
Kara bolted upright and looked around for her phone, finding it on one of the end tables. There was a single text from her mother, letting her know that she was safe and getting off the plane, and that she would take a taxi to her place.
“She said she’s going to get a taxi here as soon as she can,” Kara told her, setting her phone to the side. She took a few minutes and a slight smile started to cross her face. “I did that,” she whispered, “I saved them, me. I didn’t call in an anonymous tip, I actually saved them.”
“You’re a hero Kara,” Lena whispered, squeezing her friend’s arm. “But you always were.”