Chapter 49
“What do you mean you can’t hear her heartbeat?” Alex asked, “Can you normally hear it?”
“It’s this thing I do with people I care about, I kind of memorize their heartbeat and just idly listen to them through the day, not to be creepy, but it’s kind of comforting in a city full of noise. I can’t hear hers however and I know that she was supposed to be at work.” The urgency in Kara’s voice was growing as she strained her hearing as much as she could, searching the city for her best friend. “I have to-”
“Go, yes I know, but you aren’t going without me,” Alex stated firmly. “You aren’t in any condition to really search for her, she’s your best friend, you need someone level-headed to look for signs or clues that could tell you what happened.”
“I… alright, can you take me to L-Corp?”
Alex waved her into the car and quickly jumped in the driver’s seat, the tires squealing as she headed towards the skyscraper. “How are we going to get into the building?” Alex asked, “I imagine the guards don’t let anyone in at night.”
“They would let me in, but it might be better if we go up to the balcony,” Kara murmured, her heart racing as she thought about what she would find. Alex pulled into a parking space a block down from L-Corp and Kara was out of the car before she even finished parking. “You don’t have a problem flying do you?” She asked before picking Alex up and taking off for Lena’s balcony.
“It’s a good thing I didn’t,” Alex muttered but Kara was too focused on finding out what happened to Lena to really focus on the woman in her arms. She briefly set Alex down before triggering the biometric security on the balcony door and walking in through the doors.
“I’m going to get my suit, can you look around and see if you find anything,” Kara murmured, her quick glance around the office revealing no sight of the missing brunette.
“There’s no sign of a struggle,” the redhead murmured to herself as she examined the meticulous office. Everything was in its proper place, everything was clean, almost too clean. “Kara is Lena left or right handed?”
“She taught herself to be ambidextrous for the sake of convenience, but she prefers her right hand,” Kara replied. “Why?”
Alex just hummed and continued looking around, “Is she normally this tidy? Everything has a place and everything is in its place.”
“Lena’s not a slob,” Kara said, walking out of her best friend’s secret lab. “But she’s usually not super particular about things, that’s how her mother was, is. Lena likes to have places that look like they’re occupied, lived in rather than something cold and unfeeling, even her office.”
“Then it looks like someone cleaned up in here, made it look like there wasn’t a struggle, wasn’t anything suspicious that happened.” Alex wasn’t a detective by any means but she has picked up a few skills during her time with the DEO about assessing a crime scene and looking for clues as to what occurred. She heard a soft thunk behind her and it had Alex whirling around, pulling her gun out of her waistband, but Kara grabbed her arm before she could get it into position.
“It’s okay,” the blonde said. “It’s okay, it’s only Sara.”
“How did you get up here?” Alex asked when she saw the leather clad woman step out of the darkness, the white of her suit glowing a bit in the ambient light.
“Don’t bother asking, she’ll give you some weird ninja assassin response,” Kara replied before looking at her friend. “What are you doing here?”
“I could ask you the same question,” Sara replied. “When Lena didn’t call me like she usually does when she’s working late, I got concerned. There was no sign of her at her apartment so I came here and found you two skulking around.”
“Alex and I were- well we were on a date, and then I realized that I couldn’t hear Lena’s heartbeat anymore. I knew she was working late, so Alex brought me here.”
“You- you couldn’t hear her heartbeat?” Sara stuttered out, trying to keep a level head.
“Which could be because of any reason,” Kara continued, trying to keep Sara from having a meltdown about her girlfriend being missing.
“I think I know what happened,” Alex said, interrupting the two. She stood up from where she was crouched near Lena’s desk and held up a small dart, barely an inch long. “It’s a tranquilizer dart,” she told them, handing it over to Sara. “Whoever came in must’ve used it on Luthor to keep her quiet and then took her to a different location.”
“So she’s been kidnapped, and likely being kept some place either further out of the city or lined with lead so that Supergirl couldn’t hear her, possibly both,” Sara muttered, her eyes sharp as she thought through the various scenarios. “Who could know that much and want to kidnap her?”
“Lillian,” Kara said, “This has to be Lillian and Cadmus, nobody else would kidnap her and make it look so clean. They would want people to know that she was gone for ransom or to kill her. Only her mother would take her in such a way that no one would know she was gone.”
“Kara, if Cadmus is involved, we should really contact the DEO,” Alex commented. “We’ll be able to search for them, get back up, a team put together-”
“No Alex,” Kara interrupted. “You know as well as I that the agency you work for doesn’t trust Lena because she’s a Luthor. I know they would probably help find her if only to stop whatever Cadmus is up to, but I can’t risk Lena getting hurt in the process. I can understand helping us might be a conflict of interest and I would never ask you to put your job, or even yourself, in danger.”
“You just told me a few hours ago that Lena was family, so what kind of girlf- friend would I be if I just left now with her missing.” Alex shrugged, “Besides, officially it’s my day off now, so what I do in my personal time is my business, though I still feel like we should at least call the DEO to get some help tracking Lena.”
“I know someone who can help with that, and probably do it faster than anyone at the DEO, no offense,” Kara said, trying to keep her heart from racing at the idea that Alex maybe thought of her as her girlfriend. It was not the right time to think of such things, but Kara couldn’t help the warmth that blossomed in her chest.
Another thump was heard and Alex whirled towards the balcony with her gun, but Sara waved her off. “Don’t worry about it, I’ve called for reinforcements,” she said as Miss Martian walked through the doors, dropping a terrified Winn on the couch.
“I remembered that you said he was excellent with computers,” M’gann said as she shifted back to her human form. “I tried to get a hold of Lucy after Sara called me, but she didn’t answer her phone.”
“She was in briefings all day, she’s probably exhausted,” Kara explained. “And Kate had to head up to Portland to track some venom shipments, so it’s just us since Green Lantern is back in Coast City.” She sat down next to Winn and tapped the terrified man on the shoulder, “Winn, Winn! Snap out of it!”
“Huh? Oh, Kar- er, Supergirl, what can I do for you?” Winn asked, looking around nervously. “Why are we in Len- er Miss Luthor’s offi-”
“No time for being politically correct Winn, Lena’s missing,” Kara said. She got him up off the couch and started pushing Winn towards the hidden section of the wall where Lena kept her spare computer on a private server. Triggering the panel to reveal the hidden compartment, Kara waved between Winn and the computer. “You need to do your thing so we know exactly who took her and where they would go.”
“I’m on it,” he replied, already accessing the files on the computer and scouring it for information. “Whoa, looks like this thing has all of the information from L-Corp but separate from the company’s server, and looks like Lena has kept all the dirt on her family on this thing too.”
“She always did say that paranoia was one of the best things the Luthors taught her,” Kara whispered to Alex while Sara hovered over Winn’s shoulder. “She has all of these countermeasures set up just in case one of her crazy family members comes after her or those numerous enemies pop up randomly out of nowhere.”
“She also has a secret security camera set up in her office,” Winn commented, clicking through the files. “One that records everything that happens in her office.” He accessed the previous recordings and rewound until he found the time when Lena was supposedly abducted. “So we have three people here in Lena’s office around the right time…”
Kara leaned over and studied the screen, “That’s Lillian, Metallo and Robot Superman.”
“Cyborg Superman,” M’gann corrected, also looking at the screen. “It looks like Lillian was trying to convince Lena to go with them, but Lena refused so she drugged her anyway.” She hummed a bit and backed away from the computer, “So she definitely needs Lena alive for something, though I would love to get in the head of that woman and see what she’s thinking. I bet it’s fascinating, I haven’t been able to be in the head of a sociopathic psychopath in a while, not since that one time I encounter the clown prince of Gotham. I wonder if their minds will be similar?”
“Do you have any way to track them?” Alex asked, studying the screen. “There has to be some indication on where they took her.”
“Lena has a record on here of all of Luthor Corp’s old holdings, including ones that Lex acquired or places that she thought he might have something to do with,” Winn hummed, clicking through the list. “If I filter out everything not near or around National City… Well that shortened the list, but not enough, there’s still over 50 properties.”
“What about the kryptonite in that glowy guy?” Kara questioned, “There’s something weird about it, not like normal kryptonite, seemed more radioactive, almost unstable.”
“Like it was artificially made?” M’gann asked. At the answering nod from the blonde, the martian hummed, “Well that makes sense, despite what the DEO and Superman believe, there is not a lot of kryptonite on Earth, most of the larger chunks that came with Superman’s pod and later broke up in the atmosphere and partially dissolved while the small pieces dissolved completely. There’s enough to make weapons yes, small weapons, but not enough to turn someone into a walking kryptonite weapon.”
“So definitely artificial,” Winn mumbled to himself as he looked through the computer files. “She even has something that scans chemical signatures and air particles in case there are any radioactive compounds, and kryptonite is definitely a radioactive compound.” He pressed a few more buttons before stepping away from the computer, “Alright, the super secret satellite that Lena apparently has is scanning the city for traces of that compound.” The computer dinged and Winn glanced at the screen, “And looks like it’s found something, traces all over the city but the highest concentration is in a mountain just outside of the city.”
“That must be one of Lex’s secret bases,” Sara mentioned, “Lena told me about them, he had stashes of stuff all over the country, money, weapons, materials. She’s been trying to track them all down and clean them out but she knew she was missing a few.”
“You guys,” Winn said, interrupting the conversation. “That kryptonite that zombie guy is made of is growing even more unstable, it reading like it’s going to blow any time now, so if you’re going to do something, you better do it now.”
“Alright, M’gann you’re coming with me, Sara I know you want to come…”
“There better not be a but coming out of your mouth right now, I’m coming,” Sara retorted.
Kara pinched her brow in frustration, “You can’t fly, if Metallo blows, how are you going to get off the mountain quick enough to escape the blast? I can’t carry you and get Lena out safely if she’s been hurt.”
“M’gann can carry me,” she replied, barely shooting a look at the other woman.
The Martian rolled her eyes but nodded with Sara’s statement. “It would be good for her to come along, we might need the backup with that kryptonite around.”
“Alright, fine, like talking you out of going was going to work,” Kara grumbled before looking at the other two in the room. “Alex, Winn, you two can go home if you want.”
“I’m staying,” Alex stated firmly, her eyes not leaving Kara’s. “I want to make sure that you get out of this safely so we can go on our second date.”
“Second date? We’ve barely ended our first.”
“Let’s just say that I think the odds are in my favor,” the agent replied before pressing a quick kiss to Kara’s lips. “Go be a hero Supergirl and you can take me out for breakfast later.”
“Deal,” Kara smiled before taking off of Lena’s balcony, M’gann and Sara following after her. She heard Winn through the comm in her ear, directing her towards the mountain and relaying cautions about how much time they had before Zombie Metallo went nuclear. “We have less than half an hour before Metallo blows,” the blonde called over to her friends. “Less if he gets mad, so get in, save Lena, kick ass, get out.”
“You’re not going to try to save Lillian and her goons from the impending eruption?” M’gann asked.
Kara snorted and shook her head, “No, that’s something my cousin would do, I say they brought it on themselves really.”
“The difference between an idealist and a realist, that’s why I prefer you to your cousin,” Sara said.
“Also the fact that I’m much prettier in tights.”
Sara nodded sagely, “That too, I’m not much for the underwear on the outside look.”
The hidden mountain lair was easily located once the three knew what they were looking for, and it helped that the large bay doors in the front were left cracked open to allow light to filter out into the darkness. “I’ll give Lex Luthor an 8 for creepy lair construction, though not a perfect score because I think Lena could have done better,” Sara hummed as she peered around the opening and looked inside.
“Lena already has a creepy lair, have you been in the secret lab she keeps in her office? She has another one in her penthouse,” Kara corrected, also looking through the opening. Lillian was standing in front of Lena, on one of her usual, villainous rants about the evils of aliens polluting the world while the younger brunette was propped up between Metal Zombie 1 and Metal Zombie 2. Judging by the expression on Lena’s face, Kara knew that her best friend was not present for the conversation. “She’s totally zoned out, anybody have any plans?”
“You serve as the distraction,” M’gann said, “Sara and I will get in and get Lena away while you’re dealing with whatever Lady Macbeth wanted in this delightful facility.”
“Why do I get-” Kara started, turning to look at her friends only to find that they’ve both disappeared. “... The short end of the stick, why do they always do that?” She took another glance through the opening before launching into the air and flying through the doorway, landing only a few feet behind Lillian. “Let her go Lillian,” she said, her voice strong and firm as she stared down the woman. “I won’t let you hurt her.”
“Me?” Lillian smirked, turning to face the heroine. “Why on Earth would I want to hurt my own daughter? Is that something your alien species did regularly, hurt their own children?”
“You drug her, kidnap her, hold her here against her will, what part of that doesn’t sound like you’re hurting her?”
“She just needs guidance, the likes of you and your ‘friends’ have confused her, made her lose sight of what’s truly important, humans first and humans only.”
“What about dogs?” Lena interjected, snapping into the conversation. “My best friend has a dog, Supergirl has a dog, should we care about them? Sometimes dogs are better than people.”
“Or cats,” Supergirl continued, noticing M’gann and Sara creeping around behind the group while the three stooges had their attention on her. “We can’t forget cats, they’re so cute, and one day they will be our overlords when they become fully sentient.”
“That’s true, so obviously we should care about them, or at the very least observe them suspiciously,” Lena agreed. “If they’re eventually going to take over us, then shouldn’t we keep as close observation on them as we are aliens?”
“Or monkeys, you’ve seen Planet of the Apes right? They-”
“Enough!” Lillian cried, irritation present in her voice and on her face. “I’ve been wanting to test and see if these things work,” she said, throwing a small device at the alien. Kara reached out and grabbed the device, and immediately launched it at Metallo, wincing a little as it started to emit a loud frequency sound as it collided with his head.
“You’ve obviously never had to deal with a dog whining at you in the middle of the night begging for food,” Kara bit out. She brought her fingers to her lips and let out a piercing whistle, a blur of white and red racing into the room a few seconds later and landing in front of the group. Superdog growled and let out a sonic bark, knocking the three psychos off their feet.
Metallo hissed and his shirt started to burn off his body, exposing the glowing green kryptonite embedded in his chest. “Kara!” Winn’s voice crackled through the earpiece. “Glowing zombie guy is about to reach critical mass! You guys need to get out of there!”
Kara looked over at the man and saw that Sara was knocking him around with her staff while M’gann and Cyborg Superman went head to head. “Krypto,” Kara whispered, drawing the dog’s attention from where he was curling away from the kryptonite. “Get Lena.” She motioned to where her friend was lying on the ground groaning from hitting her head after Cyborg Superman tossed her down.
Krypto nodded and crawled over to the brunette woman and carefully latched onto Lena’s collar, urging her up and over towards Kara. “I need to kick that guy in the face,” Lena muttered, her voice slurred like she had taken far too many hits to the head. “Or you can kick him for me, and punch that bitch in the face.”
“We’ll talk about this later,” Kara said, scooping her friend up. “White Canary, Miss Martian, we have to go, come Superdog.” She could see Metallo’s veins glowing green and throbbing underneath his skin and knew it was only a matter of time. She bolted out of the lair with Lena in her arms and Krypto, M’gann and Sara not too far behind her just as an explosion with a green cloud billowing out of the mountain.
“Shit,” Sara breathed out as they stopped just far enough way to look back at the explosion. “I wonder if Lillian made it out?”
“She did,” Lena replied. “Cockroaches like her always manage to survive and return at inopportune times.”
“What did she want you for?” Kara asked, looking down at her friend.
Lena groaned and shook her head, “Not here, I want to go home, shower, get some painkillers, comfy clothes and then we can talk.”
Kara sighed her acquiescence and clicked on her ear piece. “Winn, we’ve got Lena and got out before the explosion. Lena wants to go home, so I’m going to take her there and make sure she’s okay, she hit her head pretty hard on the ground and it looks like her hand is cut.”
She heard some rustling on the other side of the comm followed by a series of thumps before Alex’s voice came across the line. “Kara, take Lena home, I’ll be over to check out her injuries.”
“I forgot you went to medical school, did you ever finish?” Kara teased, redirecting towards Lena’s apartment.
“Went more for research, but I did finally finish with help from a clandestine government agency,” Alex continued. “I may have specialized in alien biology, but I do know how to treat humans, and I imagine that Luthor doesn’t want this all over the press.”
“The wifey is correct,” Lena muttered. She had lifted up slightly in Kara’s arms to press her head against a firm shoulder, close enough to overhear her and Alex’s conversation. “I’ll let her look me over, but she better buy me dinner.”
“Your best friend owes me breakfast Luthor, take it up with her.”
“You owe me dinner and Alex breakfast,” Lena decided, pressing her head into Kara’s shoulder. “And I still reserve the right to dislike the wife,” she said to Kara. “It’s my right as your best friend.”
“I can still hear you Luthor.”
“Shit.”
“You’ve got a slight concussion, nothing major, just you’re not sleeping tonight,” Alex said, shining a light in Lena’s eyes. “And the cut on your hand isn’t bad enough for stitches, but I’m going to clean it and put a bandage over it.”
“Thank you Dr. Danvers,” Lena sighed as she watched the redhead clean up her hand. “Your bedside manner leaves much to be desired though.” Alex scowled and gave the brunette a hard pinch to her side, causing Lena to jump and yelp. “I definitely don’t like you,” she bit out, rubbing her side.
The agent rolled her eyes and was about to reply when a small commotion drew her attention to the balcony where she saw Cat Grant strutting through the open doorway. “Lena, you’re not being a very good patient,” the blonde woman said as she approached the two, Astra and Kara following her into the room.
“Ms. Grant,” Lena groaned out, “What are you doing here?”
“Don’t start Lita, I basically raised you since you were a teenager and you and my daughter became friends, of course I would come to make sure you were alright when Kara called me and told me what happened.” She turned her attention to the redhead that was trying to shrink away. “And you must be Alexandra,” Cat drawled out, her eyes critical as she assessed her daughter’s wife.
“Er, ah yes Ca- Ms. Grant,” Alex corrected when she saw the slashing motioning Lena was sending her. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“I’m sure,” Cat hummed before turning her attention to the other occupants of the room. “Ah, Sara, good, two bourbons, neat please.”
“Mom,” Kara groaned, peeling off her mask. “Really?”
“Sara is one of my favorite bartenders, though M’gann is a close second, I just don’t do dive bars much anymore, too much French Resistance for me,” Cat waved her hand, waiting for her drink. “And if I need a drink to deal with this, then Lena needs a drink as well.”
“I’ll just make some for all of us, we’ll all probably need it.” Sara tossed back a shot before pouring seven glasses of bourbon, and passed them out to the everyone in the room.
“Lena really shouldn’t drink on pain meds…” Alex said but her voice trailed off as Lena downed the aged bourbon.
“Do hush Alexandra, we’re professionals,” Cat pointed out, sitting down on the couch between Astra and Kara.
“Be nice,” Kara hissed at her mother before turning to her best friend. “Why did Lillian take you? Did she ever say?”
Lena gestured for Sara to refill her glass and leaned back in her chair. “Turns out I’m actually a Luthor,” she spat out. “Lionel was my biological father, he had an affair with my birth mother and when she died, he took me in, brought me ‘home’ to the Luthor mansion.” The brunette rolled her eyes as she spoke and leaned against Sara’s shoulder when she sat down on the arm of her recliner. “Lillian needed my blood to access something that Lex had hidden behind a biometric lock, it would only unlock for someone with Luthor blood.”
“So that’s what happened with your hand,” Kara commented. It wasn’t really a question but Lena nodded anyway before sitting upright and continuing.
“I’m not totally sure what she’s doing, but she commented that Lex got something from Superman when they were friends, stole something really and she needed me to get to it. And she also needed the isotope to help facilitate it, though I didn’t tell her that it was basically a dud, she should really learn to read lab notes.”
“Superman and Lex Luthor were friends.” “What was she looking for?” Alex and Kara blurted out at the same time, and looked at each other momentarily in surprise before glancing away.
Kara cleared her throat and looked pointedly at Lena, “What was she looking for?”
“I don’t know what it was, she got excited about a few things, but I heard Lillian and Cyborg whatshisface say something about Medusa,” Lena replied.
Astra let out a gasp as she recognized that name and the group turned to look at her. “You know that name,” M’gann stated. “You are familiar with it, something from Krypton.”
“Y-yes,” Astra hesitated momentarily, looking over at Kara. “It’s something Zor-El and Jor-El were working on as a favor for the military guild and high council, a weapon to protect Krypton.”
“A weapon…” Kara murmured, “What is is?”
“It’s… it’s a virus,” the older woman finally answered. “A virus designed to kill any non Kryptonians in case Krypton was ever invaded. I imagine that Jor-El included it with that stupid fortress he built for his son, for what reason I don’t know.”
Kara blinked before her brow furrowed, “Wait, my father and my uncle designed a weapon, a virus to commit mass genocide, and a psycho terrorist now has it?”
“And wait, you said it would kill any non-kryptonians, does that include humans as well?”
“In theory yes, but I don’t imagine this woman would think of that, only see it as a means to rid herself of the “alien” menace,” Astra continued while Kara was lost in thought.
“My mother probably wouldn’t even think of that,” Lena groaned before another thought entered her mind. “Wait, that’s what she needs the isotope for, to turn the virus into a gas, as soon as she attempts that, she’ll neutralize the virus and it won’t hurt anyone.”
“Guess we can thank your mother this time for being an inefficient terrorist,” Sara commented.
The group was relieved that Lena was back, mostly safe from harm, and Lillian’s devious plot was already thwarted by her own efforts. Alex glanced over at Kara though and took in the distressed look on her face, her mind far away from the conversation at hand.