Chapter 36
“So Thanksgiving is coming up,” Kara commented, glancing over at her best friend. They were having their weekly breakfast at Noonan’s before they both had to head into work, Lena with her coffee and bagel, and Kara her latte and four sticky buns. “It’s your first one since moving back to National City, are you going to Metropolis or are you going to continue our Thanksgiving tradition and spend it with Mom and I?”
“Unless Lillian calls me back to Metropolis in some sort of family bonding moment,” Lena mused. “Or, heaven forbid, she comes here.”
Kara had the displeasure of meeting the woman before and she gave a full body shiver at the thought of the woman coming to National City. “That… that wouldn’t be good,” she said, shaking her head.
“Especially with the large alien population in the city.”
“Did you find anything else about… what was it, Cadmus?” Kara asked. Her friend had mentioned before about finding records with the name, but never said anything else about it.
Lena’s eyes widened and she set down her coffee. “I forgot,” she said after wiping her mouth. “I have looked into it some more, haven’t found much, but what I have found it’s not good.”
“Cadmus was a greek hero wasn’t he?” Kara asked, thinking back to her myths and legends class. Many of the creatures from the legends sounded like actual alien species, but Kara couldn’t know for sure.
“Yes,” the brunette nodded, biting into her bagel, “He was one of the first actually. The first king of Thebes and was a monster slayer, which is the image this group is trying to portray.”
“What?”
“It’s an anti-alien group,” she explained. “Started up sometime after Superman exposed himself, which inadvertently exposed the existence of aliens to the general populace. Pretty much like the Nazis, they want to cleanse the world from the alien infestation, that’s what they claim anyway.”
“So what they say is different from what they are?”
Lena hummed a bit before answering, “Well, they are anti-aliens, but it seems they’re more into experimenting on them, figuring out how they work to advance humanity, some humanity anyway. Still very Nazi-like, but also a very poorly disguised method of world domination.”
“Typical bad guy stuff then.”
“Yes, and my mother is involved with it up to her perfectly plucked eyebrows, mark my words,” Lena replied, finishing her bagel. “I don’t know if Le- if he was involved, but she definitely is, why else would it be in my company’s private servers?”
“You’ve said that before Lee.”
“I know, but it’s entirely annoying that all of this was going on right under my nose,” she grumbled. “Do you know how many staff I’ve had to fire to root out the infestation? And I don’t even know if I’ve gotten them all because some of them are really good employees and really good at hiding their prejudice.”
“So what are you going to do?”
Lena shrugged, “Wait until they screw up, and hope that it isn’t something catastrophic that ends up hurting people or the company.” She waved her hand around, “Enough about me though, what about you, what are you going to do about Alex?”
Kara averted her eyes and fiddled with her cup, “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Oh come on Kara, it’s been what, a month since Alex and Maggie broke up, and you’ve been actively avoiding Alex since then,” Lena pointed out. “You can’t keep hiding forever.”
“I’m not hiding from her,” Kara retorted. “I just don’t know what to do.”
“Seduce her.”
The blonde nearly spit out the drink she had taken at Lean’s words. “I’m not going to seduce her,” Kara protested and Lena nodded.
“You’re right, some of the looks she’s been giving you indicate that it wouldn’t take much seduction, more like just making known you’re interested and she’ll jump in your bed.”
“Lena,” Kara hissed, shooting her friend a dark look.
The brunette just shrugged and glanced up at the door, a wicked grin appearing on her face. “Well, speak of the devil,” she said, and Kara knew instantly that Alex had walked through the doors. Before Kara could stop her, Lena was waving the woman over with a call of “Danvers.”
Alex saw her and ordered her coffee before walking over to sit down with them, choosing the seat next to Kara. “Hey,” she greeted, “Haven’t seen much of either of you this past month.”
Lena kicked Kara under the table, knowing that it wouldn’t hurt but it would annoy her best friend. The blonde shot her a dirty look before looking back at Alex. “We heard about your break up with Maggie,” she said. “Figured you wanted some time by yourself.”
The agent just shrugged, “I’m fine, it’s fine, Maggie and I were always better off as friends anyway. I knew that she was still in love with her ex when we got together, but we were both really lonely, just wanted to stave off the loneliness a little.”
“I can understand that, no shame in that,” Lena replied. “I have to go though, no rest for the CEO of a billion dollar company. Kara, I’ll text you later about Thanksgiving.”
Kara resisted the urge to glare at her friend as Alex moved around the table to take Lena’s vacated seat. “You guys are spending Thanksgiving together?” Alex asked, drawing the blonde’s attention.
“We usually do,” Kara replied. “When we met in middle school, Lena would spend Thanksgiving with me and my adoptive family until she moved back to the east coast for school.”
“Adoptive family? I didn’t know you were adopted.”
“My parents died when I was thirteen in um, in a fire.”
“Oh,” Alex whispered, “I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s fine, I mean, it still hurts, but they’re always with me you know?” Kara continued, staring into brown eyes, “And, I mean, I have my mom and my little brother now, and amazing friends, even if I don’t see all of them all the time, so it didn’t turn out too bad.”
“My father died too,” the brunette said after a few minutes. “I mean, I was older, just past my 16th birthday. He went to work for this government agency and just… Never came home.”
“I’m sorry Alex…”
Shaking her head, Alex smiled sadly, “It’s just me and my mom now, though she can be… A bit much sometimes.”
“Are you going to see her for Thanksgiving?”
“She’s coming here. She’s been doing some lecture tours around the world, so rented her house out to some grad students back in Midvale studying at the local university. It’ll be easier if she comes here too since I might have to work.”
“Working on Thanksgiving,” Kara shook her head, remembering all of the times she’s had to pull her mother away from work so they could have Thanksgiving dinner together. Most often, Kara would eat the entire turkey herself while Cat demolished a salad and half a bottle of wine, especially since Carter’s dad had him for Thanksgiving. “My mom does that a lot, she tends to get wrapped up in things.”
“I spend a lot of time in my lab,” Alex admitted, “My boss has to make me leave sometimes or I forget to shower, or eat.”
“Now that truly is a crime,” Kara cracked a smile, causing the other woman to wink at her. Kara felt a flush creep up her neck and willed her face not to redden any further, but it didn’t work since the brunette just smirked at her.
The blonde finished her plate of sticky buns and her drink while Alex drank her own breakfast. Her phone chimed on the table and she glanced down, seeing a text from Winn flash across her screen. ‘Why is Leslie Willis in Ms. Grant’s office?’
Kara rolled her eyes at the text and decided not to answer. The DJ of CatCo late night radio has been a thorn in her side ever since her mother hired her. She was crass, rude, ruthless, and thought far too much about her opinion, which she shared freely across the airwaves for her fans and followers. Recently, the woman had become more vocal against Supergirl, something that Cat wouldn’t stand for since Supergirl and CatCo were linked entities. It didn’t surprise her after Leslie’s recent tirade the previous night that her mother had called her into her office, most likely to read her the riot act. ‘I don’t know you’re the one that’s there,’ Kara typed out a quick reply and then put her phone away.
“Problem?” Alex asked, watching her actions curiously.
“Just one of my coworkers, he wanted to know why Ms. Grant was in a meeting with someone so early in the morning,” Kara replied. “Especially since I’m not even there yet.”
“Grant not often have meetings before 8 in the morning?”
“Not usually, unless she needs to contact one of the overseas branches, but she had to call the nighttime DJ in this morning.”
“Nighttime DJ, you don’t me Leslie Willis do you?”
“You listen to late night CatCo radio?” Kara teased, “Never knew that about you Danvers.”
“Well there’s not much else to listen to in National City late at night, and the rage at listening to Willis’s opinion for a few hours on end kept me awake through the late shift,” Alex replied, a teasing smile on her face. “Honestly, I don’t know why Grant hired her, she doesn’t seem to fit the image of CatCo, she’s…”
“Crass, crude, idiotic?”
Alex let out a laugh that caused Kara’s heart to twinge slightly. “Yes, all of those things, Grant doesn’t seem the type to suffer fools easily and only want the best around her.” She sent Kara a wink, “I mean, she hired you as her assistant.”
Her heart warmed and her breath caught in her throat as she looked in the smiling brown eyes across from her. “I- I need to go, get to work and all that,” Kara stuttered out, packing up her things. “I have to get Ms. Grant’s latte and make sure the rest of her day is lined up after this meeting.”
“Don’t let me keep you, I have to get to work as well,” Alex replied, standing up to see Kara out. “I hope it’s not another month before we see each other again Kara.”
“Of course, just text me, just because you and Maggie broke up doesn’t mean that we can’t be friends.”
The word ‘friends’ tasted sour on her mouth even as she said them, and she walked out of Noonan’s, leaving Alex behind staring after her.
“I’m really sorry about Leslie Mom,” Kara murmured as she helped her mother prepare Thanksgiving dinner. “I didn’t realize that I could conduct electricity like that, I mean, I was hit, but she was the one that got hurt.”
“It’s not your fault Kara, you saved her life, whatever kind of life she’ll have after this anyway,” the older woman replied. “No, Leslie being up in that chopper was my fault, I really should have just moved her to a time with less ear-traffic, or moved her to a smaller radio station outside of the city.”
“You wouldn’t fire her?”
“No, for all of Leslie’s faults, and there are many, she is still exceptionally good at her job,” Cat mused. “She does like to stir up a controversy.”
“Controversy seems to be her default setting Mom and that’s not always a good thing,” Kara countered. “Do you want me to heat up the turkey? It hasn’t finished cooking and Lena, Lucy, and Winn will be over soon.”
“I can’t believe you invited that cardigan hobbit,” the older blonde sighed, sipping at her wine as she gestured for Kara to go ahead and cook the bird. “Did you at least inform him not to wear one of those monstrosities in my penthouse?”
Kara rolled her eyes and stifled back a smile. She knew her mother never really cared much about what her employees wore, unless they were in her line of sight or were in the public eye. Unfortunately since Winn’s desk was right across from hers, he was constantly visible whenever Cat left her office or came back from an extremely annoying meeting with the board members. “I told him to dress casually Mom so leave him alone,” Kara responded before she zapped the turkey with her heat vision, roasting it to perfection.
“I’ll be nice,” Cat replied, rolling her eyes a bit as she sipped at her wine. “And for that matter, what is the superior Lane doing here? I figured she would be having Thanksgiving with the lesser Lane and Boy Wonder, definitely not her workaholic father.”
“Lois and Clark spend Thanksgiving in Kansas with his family, Lucy will most likely see them at Christmas. I was invited to meet the Kents, but I declined. I didn’t want to pass up our Thanksgiving traditions, and I think that Clark understands that we aren’t going to be a happy family like the last decade of him ignoring me didn’t happen.”
“Do you think you'll ever have a relationship with him?” Cat asked. “It's fine with me whatever you decide, he is your family after all.”
“I'm more concerned with the errant family members I have threatening the safety of our city rather than my cousin.”
Cat nodded, knowing the girl was referring to her wayward aunt. “Have you heard from her? Astra.”
Kara shook her head, “No, haven't really heard a peep out of them since the break in at Lord technologies.”
“I didn't ask when you last fought with them, when did you last speak with Astra?”
The younger blonde let out a sigh, “It's been over a month now, I just wish… I just wish there was another way, I wish we could work together to save Earth and not resort to such radical tactics. Humans are so clever, so caring, they just need to be given a chance.”
“Sometimes I think you're too good for this world Kara,” her mother mused. “You have more faith in us than we deserve.”
“Or maybe, you just need to have more faith in each other.” The buzzer front the elevator on the lobby floor rang, breaking the women from their conversation. Kara used her x-ray vision to peer through the different floors, and learned a few things about her old neighbors that she didn’t need to know, before locating the lobby. “It’s Lucy, Winn, and Lena.” She hit the button to send the elevator down to them without having to use an access key, and used her super speed to finish getting the table ready and set everything down.
“Go ahead and carve the turkey too Kara, we don’t need to make a grand spectacle of it,” Cat told her, grabbing another bottle of wine to pair with dinner.
Kara had just finished slicing the turkey when the elevator doors opened and her three friends bustled in, Lena strolling in like she owned the place, while Lucy followed curiously. Winn lingered in the elevator, frozen in fear at entering the Cat Grant’s penthouse. Lena glanced back and rolled her eyes before grabbing him by his shirt collar and tugged him out of the elevator. “Man up Winn and grow some balls,” Lena hissed as she drug him behind her. She dropped him in a heap on one of the chairs at the table and took the bottle he was clutching out of his hands. “For you,” she said, offering the whiskey to Cat before glancing over at Kara. “This,” she said, gesturing back towards the still petrified man, “Is exactly why I don’t date men.”
“I thought it was because you liked boobs,” Lucy said as she generously filled her wine glass.
“That too,” the brunette conceded, snatching the wine from Lucy’s hands. “Sharing is caring Luce.”
“Girls,” Cat warned before the two could start squabbling. She turned a critical eye on the lone male at the table who shrunk even further down in his seat, “Oh do sit up Winslow, nobody likes a slouch.”
“Yes Ms. Grant,” he replied, bolting upright in his chair.
Cat nodded and then turned back to the table, raising a glass, “Let's give thanks then for family and friends before partaking in this food.” She paused for a moment before nodding, “Alright, dig in.”
The five quickly filled their plates and glasses and dug into their meal, talking about idle subjects. Well, Lucy, Lena, Kara and Cat talked while Winn ate his food, chiming in every now and then, and attempted to maintain his cover as a piece of furniture. They made it through the meal and were about to start dessert when Cat’s cell phone chimed from where she left it in the kitchen. She stood and grabbed it from the counter, quickly clicking through her messages. “There’s a massive power outage at CatCo,” she said. She glanced up and her eyes zeroed in on Winn, “You, Walt, you’re coming with me, you do something something with computers right?”
“Um, yes, I am the IT guy,” he started but Cat just pulled him out of his chair.
“Good, you’ll need to test the servers to make sure they’re still functioning correctly.” The older woman toted the increasingly nervous looking man to the elevator, grabbing her purse along the way. “Don’t eat all of the dessert Kara, we should be back shortly.”
“Poor Winn,” Kara muttered as she watched her friend get dragged out of the penthouse and back to work.
“Don’t feel too sorry for him,” Lena said, taking the bottle of wine abandoned on the table and refilling her glass. “This will be good for him, maybe he won’t be so terrified of Ms. Grant with this constant, upfront exposure.”
“I doubt it,” Lucy told her, sipping at her own drink. “I remember the few times I came over to pick you up for dates, and the woman continually terrified me.”
“Mom can be terrifying at times, but she means well,” Kara defended. She filled her plate up with more food and steadily ate through the turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and variety of vegetables.
“I’m sure, but let’s focus on something different for now, such as what are you going to do about the sexy Agent Danvers,” Lucy started, a mischievous look on her face. It didn’t take her long to drag the full story about her odd interactions with Alex Danvers out of the blonde, and she instantly teamed up with Lena to get the two women together. “You know she's a jealous one right? I've been in the DEO a few times since we all had dinner, and she glares at me when she's not trying to subtly ask me about you.”
“She does seem like the type that would have a jealous streak,” Lena mused. “Wonder what's keeping her from asking Kara out on a date?” She turned to Kara, “Or you for that matter, I mean, she's not dating Maggie anymore. Maggie is even totally supportive of you two getting together, so what is the hang up?”
Kara sighed, “I don't even know, I can't explain it… I'm afraid really, I'm afraid that she's going to find out the truth about me, about us, and she'll hate me for it.”
“She probably will Kara, nobody likes being lied to, but you have to have faith that you'll both work it out,” Lucy said, setting her hand on Kara’s shoulder.
The blonde was about to respond to Lucy’s statement when something triggered in her hearing, and she twisted her head to focus on the noise. It was Cat’s heartbeat, erratic and elevated in her ears. “I need a little help here Supergirl,” Cat hissed, and Kara was in her suit and out of the window within a matter of seconds. She zeroed in on Cat on the top floor of CatCo and burst through one of the windows, landing in front of her just in time to absorb a strong wave of electricity. She shook off the blow and stared at the woman across from her, taking in the wild, spiky white hair and manic look in her eyes. “Leslie,” she murmured, trying to make sense of what she was seeing.
“It’s Livewire,” the woman countered, an evil smirk crossing her face. Her hands sparked again and she blasted two arcs of electricity at the superhero, which Kara counter with a quick blast of cold air, freezing the air and particles around the charged waves, counteracting them. Livewire growled and launched herself at Supergirl, while Cat ran for her elevator to get out of the way. Electricity raced through Kara’s body, and she grit her teeth to fight back the pain before finally landing a punch that sent Livewire sprawling on the ground. She disappeared in a flash back into the electrical sockets and Kara heard the elevator car shake and groan. Leslie’s face appeared on the screen but she ignored it in favor of rocketing down the elevator shaft to catch the runaway carriage.
Kara grabbed hold of the falling elevator and slowed it down so as not to jerk around the woman inside of it before bringing to a stop and throwing the hatch open. “Are you okay?” She asked, calling down to her mother.
“Yes, yes I’m fine, what happened to Livewire?” Cat asked, standing up.
“Gone,” Kara replied, “Let’s get you out of here.” She reached down and pulled her mother up out of the car and gently flew up to the executive floor again, depositing her in her office. “What happened to Winn?”
“I sent him down to security as soon as Leslie’s alter ego showed herself. He probably called the police too, and whatever metahuman clean-up squad the government has in this town.”
Kara heard sirens rushing towards the building and glanced down to see several black SUVs and vans pull up outside of the building. “They’re here, it’s the DEO. Do you want me to stay?”
“No, no Kara, go back to my penthouse, keep those two lushes you call friends from drinking all of my wine. I’ll call you as soon as I can.”
“Are you sure?”
Cat narrowed her eyes and shooed Kara towards the balcony, “If I can’t handle a shady government agency at this point in my career, then I’m not a very good journalist.”
Nodding, Kara took off back towards the penthouse and leftover Thanksgiving dinner still waiting for her, but her mind was preoccupied with Livewire and what happened to her.
“I don’t think this is a good idea Mom,” Kara whispered to her mother before the woman started laying her trap to capture Livewire.
“I want my life back Supergirl, and we need to get Livewire off the streets. I don’t have much faith in that black-ops group for their plan to work so we need to do something, and Lena provided you with an alternative option didn’t she?”
Supergirl shrugged, “It’s more like she said just hose her down, the water should short her out.”
“Can always count on that girl for a simple answer,” Cat murmured. “Shall we get started?” The woman flipped on the mic in front of her and her voice was broadcast over the airwaves, her message directed towards the electro-maniac racing through the wires. It was a taunting message, one to draw the woman out and back to the studio where she spouted her sarcasm and hate filled rhetoric to the teeming masses. When she finished, Cat ventured out to Leslie’s studio and stood in front of it, waiting for her.
It didn’t take long for Leslie to appear, and start mouthing off terrible Cat puns and misplaced anger. Kara landed right in front of Livewire, taking her by surprise and knocking her away from the CEO. “Was wondering when you were going to show up,” Leslie grunted, standing up. “Cat’s little bi-” Kara landed a hard punch against her jaw before she could finish her sentence, knocking her back again. Growling, Livewire disappeared into the transformer above them, sucking the power out before taking form again. Her electricity formed whips and she lashed out at the blonde superhero, jerking her around before throwing her hard on the ground.
Kara used the moment to glance beneath her, locating the waterline, and punched through the ground, pulling the pipe up with her. A loud scream pulled from Leslie’s throat as the water touched her and the electricity coursing through her shorted out before dropping to the ground unconscious in a steaming heap. Several minutes later, one of the DEO vans pulled up the road as Supergirl was fixing the water pipe with her heat vision and repairing the road as best as she could. “You couldn’t wait until we got our plan in place?” Alex asked as she stepped out of the van, surveying Livewire’s downed form. “Though it does seem you took care of the problem rather well.”
“Cat contacted me,” Supergirl replied, nodding her head at the other woman. “She didn’t want this looming over her for the rest of her Thanksgiving weekend, and neither did I really.”
“Well I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but we have a situation that needs your attention,” the agent said, signalling her team to start neutralizing the unconscious woman. “We have managed to capture the leader of the rogue Kryptonians that have been terrorizing the city for the past few months, the leader actually. She refuses to speak to anyone but you though.”
Astra, Kara thought before turning her focus to the agent. “Did you inform her that I do not work with or for your organization?”
“We really do need for you to talk to her, find out what she knows,” Alex repeated. “Our director, Hank Henshaw, I believe he has spoken with you, the other Kryptonians have taken him in retaliation.”
Hank Henshaw, J’onn J’onzz, the Green Martian. “I will speak with her,” Kara agreed, and allowed the agents to escort her to the DEO facilities in the desert. She was led down different corridors until she felt a small tingle run along her spine. “You have Kryptonite here?” She asked, alarmed.
“It’s the only way we can keep General In-Ze contained,” Alex admitted.
Kara gave her a sharp look, “You do know that Kryptonite is poisonous to our kind, could cause permanent radiation damage if exposed long enough.” At the woman’s blank look, the blonde rolled her eyes and strode into the room, fighting against the desire to grab hold of her stomach as the effects of Kryptonite slammed into her. Her aunt was in a small cage made of glass in the center of room with green lights shining all around them. “Astra,” Kara greeted, her face stoic. “I don’t believe for a minute that you were captured, so why did you let them capture you?”
“What makes you think I let myself get captured?”
“I know you, I know that you would never let down your guard enough to be captured, not unless you wanted to be caught.”
“I am pleased to see that your wit has not dulled in the years you’ve been living among these humans.”
“We’ve talked before Astra, you have tried repeatedly to convert me to your cause and it hasn’t worked, why do you think this time would work?” Kara asked, ignoring Astra’s statement. When the woman didn’t respond, Kara started to pace, “The agents claim that their director was taken hostage as soon as you were in retaliation, are you going to help them find him?”
“A hostage for a hostage, as is our way Little One, you know that.” Kara nodded and turned to leave when she heard a small clink behind her. Turning, she spotted a small device her her aunt’s hand, one she hadn’t seen in years. “You want to know why I allowed myself to be captured,” Astra said, “I wanted to tell you the truth, how I ended up in Fort Rozz.”
“You killed someone,” Kara said, her face hard. “I already know that, mother locked you away.”
“Your mother didn’t lock me away for that,” the woman countered. “The High Council locked us away to keep up from speaking the truth, to keep us from telling people what was happening to Krypton, what would happen, and my sister used you to do it.”
Kara shook her head, “You’re lying.”
“That day, you called me with your spy beacon, was that your idea or your mother’s?” The girl thought back, her mind vaguely recalling the conversation with her mother the day before her aunt disappeared. “We were trying to save Krypton, Kara,” Astra continued, “And all we want to do is make sure that the humans don’t destroy their planet as well. If some have to be sacrificed, then so be it.”
“No,” the blonde countered. “No, we keep going round and round on this Aunt Astra, I can’t and won’t let you hurt them, there are other ways to accomplish your goals, less violent options.” She turned to storm out of the room, leaving the imprisoned woman to stare after her.
During their argument, neither woman noticed the mirror on the wall and the woman behind it in the next room watching and listening to everything. Alex stared into the room, her eyes wide as she thought about what the prisoner had said. “Kara…”