The snap

She doesn’t connect the dots at first. 

She knows about the threat. This deranged Thanos figure on a quest to gather magical stones and wipe out all of humanity. It’d sound straight out of a comic book, if the briefing notes weren’t so alarming, their bottom line clear: this isn’t to be taken lightly. A point frighteningly driven home by the attack on New York and the suspected abduction of Steven Strange and Tony Stark. 

Word was, it even had Director Fury rattled. 

She’d asked to join, of course. She’s Kara’s partner: where Kara goes, she goes. But J’onn had reasoned they needed her stateside. So, she’d seen her out with the usual pep talk, confident she’d make it back for sister night that very evening. 

(After all, what could possibly go wrong? All Earth’s mighty heroes had to do was successfully separate Vision from his stone, with the assistance of one of the most technologically advanced nations. A piece of cake. They’d all live to see another day, the world’d keep on turning, oblivious to the danger.)

She read the alerts about the bogeys over Wakanda, declined Vasquez‘ offer of a second coffee (too tense to stomach anything) and waited. Then waited some more, the mounting nervosity inside the DEO’s command centre palpable. 

Until the news started pouring in from everywhere: planes crashing, trains colliding, boats capsizing. Too much information to be processed all at once. 

Even then, she’d envisioned a terrorist attack: a coordinated hit on multiple US targets, a second 9/11 if you will. 

The thought that they’d actually lost hadn’t crossed her mind. 

It’s not until Brainy disappears, right there, that this horrible sinking feeling takes hold. One minute he’s standing next to her, off on one of his tangents, as oblivious as always to the fact that he’s slowly (but surely) losing Alex’s attention. The next he’s just gone. 

Vanished. 

She blinks: “Brainy?” It’s a reflex: she crouches down and reaches for her hip, frantically looking around for the threat. “Brainy!”

Something’s wrong.

And it’s not just him: all around her agents are disappearing. Or rather, being replaced by minuscule fragments floating in place. What… Are they… Disintegrating? Decomposing? Atomising? Leaving behind this pile of particles or… Oh God: ashes. Small heaps here and there, littering the atrium’s floor. 

Until she’s the only one left. 

Chilling certainty replaces the dread of earlier: something’s very wrong. She draws her gun. The cold metal and familiar weight do little to soothe her frazzled nerves. She keeps her eyes trained on the command centre’s entrance. 

Sudden movement has her lifting her gun, body tense and arms stiff.

J’onn comes flying down the stairs. 

“J’onn,” she shouts in relief, standing up and lowering her weapon. “Thank God! Brainy just…” She shakes her head, her free hand rubbing her forehead. “I don’t even know how to… I think he disappeared?” She knows she sounds agitated, but to hell with decorum. “I… What’s going on?” 

Uncharacteristically, J’onn offers little comfort: “Alex.” He sounds pained. He reaches out with a troubling grimace and as she steps forward to embrace him, he falters. 

His grip on her forearm tightens to the point it hurts. “J’onn?”

He sinks down on one knee, lifts his head up to her. “I’m sorry” is all he has the time to say, before he too, turns to dust. She watches, paralysed, as the hand holding on – so firm, so familiar – fades away. 

She stumbles back, looking for purchase, for something solid to lean against. Her heart’s racing, its staccato too loud in the resounding silence. She feels like something’s pressing down, like she can’t breathe, like she’s… choking. She forces herself to gulp down quick puffs of air and with each breath, tries to focus on the up and down movement of the hand – her hand – on her chest. 

The monitors in front of her continue to show images of planes falling from the sky, of critical infrastructure blowing up. She doesn’t know how long she stands there, staring blankly at the live feed.

A flash of clarity cuts through the fog: Kara. They need Kara.She has to find a way to get in touch with her and convince her to come back ASAP. She rolls her sleeve up and presses once to activate the signal watch. There, that should do it. Any time now…

The screens turn to black, the lights flicker out. The electricity must be down. She tightens her grip on her gun. The sudden ringtone of a cell phone somewhere to her left makes her jump. The tune is familiar, yet she can’t place its owner. It rings and rings, until it stops just as abruptly. 

Yes, any time now…

The back up generators kick in: the emergency lighting plunges the room in a unsettling red haze. The monitors however, remain lifeless.

“Director Danvers?” 

She turns, gun pointed at the emerging shadow she slowly recognises as Vasquez. The petite woman advances towards her, gun drawn, on guard.  

She barely recognises her own voice when she calls: “Over here.” 

A curse in Spanish, under her breath, followed by: “What’s happening?”

Alex shakes her head, at a loss: “Where’re you coming from?”

“The training room. We were sparring. Then suddenly, everyone just… everyone was just… gone.”

She asks, the panic churning up her gut: “Everyone? How many were you?”

“Hix, Igle, Price. We must’ve been… I think about ten?”

Jesus. Nine agents down, just like that. What the fuck? Together with the ones she was with here, that must bring the total to… She wipes the sweat off her forehead.

Something’s gone horribly wrong.

“The same happened here. I don’t know what’s going on. None of the alarms went off. It’s as if…” She furrows her brow: it’s as if they’re under attack, only from an enemy that’s managed so far to remain undetected.

“They’re not… gone gone, right? They’re just… They’re somewhere else, like… like teleportation, right? Or… Or kidnapped…”

Alex’d like to think so (something tells her that’s wishful thinking). She tries to sound convincing when she replies: “Yeah.”

“Should we activate a code red?”

Right, their emergency protocol. She should’ve thought of that straight away. She was hoping that… (Where is Kara?) She needs to get it together! 

They radio Command and to her immense relief, someone answers immediately. (Who’d have thought she’d ever be so delighted to hear Haley’s voice.) The news itself, though, is chilling. The DEO’s not the first agency to check in. All are experiencing the same sudden and mysterious disappearances. (Haley does sound surprised to hear Aliens are just as affected as Humans.) Reports coming in describe chaos all over the country: hospitals in disarray; fires breaking out; air, maritime and road traffic interrupted. There’s even news of large-scale explosions. 

The consensus is that it’s all connected, that they’re indeed under attack. They just don’t know by whom or by what. The usual suspects: Iran, North Korea, Russia and China seem to be just as targeted, plus there’s been no confirmed nuclear activity. AI technology shouldn’t be advanced enough to pull something of this magnitude off and the natural or artificial virus hypothesis is deemed unlikely. Which leaves only one possibility: something, someone, from another world.

The airspace and all physical border crossings are closed until further notice. POTUS is secure in an undisclosed location and has called upon the Army to step in. The National Guard’s being mobilised and all able personnel is to lend a hand to law enforcement in the streets. 

(And if that’s the case: if it’s not just the DEO, if it’s not just the United States, then Kara’s not safe.) 

She asks, because how could she not: there’s no news coming out of Wakanda. Haley doesn’t have to say it for Alex to hear it loud and clear: this is one of those exceptions to the “no news, good news” rule.

Fuck. Fuck. Triple fuck.

She has to make sure Kara’s ok. She reaches blindly for her phone; her hands tremble so much it takes her two separate attempts to unlock it and access her contacts. She calls Kara first: it goes straight to voicemail. That in itself doesn’t mean anything. She’s probably still fighting. And if the battle’s not raging anymore, then she must be looking for survivors or tending to the injured. That’s Kara for you: tirelessly trying to help. She calls their mother next, but doesn’t get through: the network’s busy. She goes for broke and dials Mr G’s number, their mother’s neighbour, just in case, only to stumble on the same obnoxious beeping. 

She sees her mother’s house, as if she were there, standing on the porch. A soft tune wafting through the open front door, the faint sounds of someone puttering inside and humming along. 

“Director Danvers?” 

She shakes the image off and puts her phone away. None of this means anything. She’ll try again later.

The many emergency drills J’onn was always so adamant they go through take over. She sends Vasquez to round up those who remain and to check on the holding cells. Alex meanwhile gathers equipment. The number of agents she finds upon her return is disconcerting, to say the least. She doesn’t exactly know how many were supposed to be in today, but it feels about a good third, if not half, is missing.

Jesus.

“Is everyone ok?”

She’s met with stony silence. What a stupid question. None of them are, they’re all in shock. Right. She takes a deep breath, trying to wade through her thoughts, still too disturbed to carefully craft a rousing speech (she wouldn’t know what to say anyway).

“I’m going to level with you: I – we – have no idea what’s going on. I don’t know what just happened to our colleagues. I don’t know what we’ll find outside. But I’ll be damned if that prevents us from doing something about it.” Murmured assent, small nods here and there. “Here’s what we do know: what we just witnessed is happening all over the country. We’ve been asked to report to local PD and help out, as best we can, so that’s what we’re going to do. Here’s everything you need. Channel 1 is to be kept open at all times. Valdes will monitor it and let me know if there’re any major communications from Command.” She tosses a radio into Valdes’ waiting hands. “Use Channel 2 for internal communications. We stick together for now. We’ll spread out and break up in smaller teams according to need. Make sure your vest is snug and your gun’s loaded and ready at all times.” She checks the number of rounds left in hers. “If you don’t have one, come see me. Again: I do not know what we’ll find out there. One last thing: I know you’re thinking of your families. We all want to make sure our loved ones are safe. You’ve probably tried calling them by now and seen that the network’s down. Keep on trying, ok? Keep on trying.”

She hands the flashlights over, distributes the radios, water bottles and first aid kits, and sees everyone out. She takes one last look at the atrium, nods to the few agents who’ll stay behind and follows suit.

Outside, the harsh daylight is blinding. They’re greeted by the thick smell of smoke and sound of wailing sirens. Still, it’s a relief to escape the building‘s doomsday atmosphere. She tilts her head up to the sky and closes her eyes, takes a big breath, exhales and repeats the motion.

Kara’s ok. 

She’s Kryptonian. A superhero, for God’s sake. 

She simply has to be ok.