The snap

She doesn’t go to L-Corp herself. 

Because something comes up and National City is on the other side of the country. Because she’s unsure of the reception she’d get. (Mostly: because she’s a coward.)

It’s not an easy sell: the Avengers‘ file on the Luthors is among the lengthiest. Natasha agrees soon enough (“You sure about this?”, “200%”, “Good enough for me.”) but Steve remains unconvinced. Alex insists, vouches for Lena and eventually wears him down. She coaches Bruce Banner and Natasha to name drop Dr Pym and advises them against bringing Scott Lang along. Let’s face it: as fond as Lena may be of puppy dog personalities (no, she won’t think of Kara), his cluelessness isn’t going to impress the CEO in the slightest.

Lena being Lena, she formulates conditions: she demands to see the quantum machine in action. But she agreed to hear them out, which Alex knows to be a win. (She can’t wait to see the look on her face when she discovers the much hyped machine is essentially a broken-down van. Which apparently isn’t even Scott Lang’s, but the property of someone called Luis instead, a recurring character in his disjointed stories.)

She spends three sleepless nights obsessing over the many apologies she owes Lena. As genuine as they may be, her words of atonement and assurances of contrition taste like too little too late. She’s so antsy the day of Lena’s scheduled visit, she offers to man the monitors, instead of welcoming their guest to the compound. Natasha must sense her trepidation, for she lets her isolate herself without an argument.

She keeps herself busy: she guides the L-Corp jet through its descent, makes her fourth coffee of the morning and fights the temptation to eavesdrop on the meeting taking place in the hangar.

Lena corners her after a rather frustrating exchange with Okoye. She senses her before she sees her and pushes away from the table, stiff with dread.

Lena’s on the threshold, leaning against the doorframe, dressed to the nines. She wonders how long she’s been standing there, observing her. It puts Lena at an advantage. She swallows, it feels so surreal to be in her presence after all this time. 

The alley flashes before her eyes: Lena under an umbrella, rain pelting down on them. Familiar eyes filled with questions, hard with judgement, foreign with contempt.

“There you are. I was wondering when I’d run into you.”

That’s all it takes: some warmth to her tone and the ghost of a smile. All of the tension that’s been accumulating in Alex’s shoulders, in her spine, all the worrying, leaves her at once. She’s taken by surprise at how… glad – thrilled even – she is to see the CEO.

The fact that Lena clearly sought her out goes unsaid. So does the reason she had to in the first place: Alex hiding out. Cautious, she fights the smile that wants to break free: “You found me.”

“Is it Agent or Director Danvers these days? I forget.”

Straight for the jugular it is, then. 

“Neither. I resigned.” She owns her decision and yet, for the first time, she’s almost ashamed to admit it out loud. For so long, the DEO was her entire – her only – world. Still, she’ll be damned if she lets that transpire. “But you already knew that.” No one finds out about her vendetta against organised crime and tracks her down on the other side of the globe without a very thorough background check.

Lena ignores the comment. “That’s a shame. I hear you led one of the most successful post-Snap emergency responses in the entire country.”  

She thinks of Vasquez and all the others – the injured, the dead – and grimaces: “Yeah right.” 

Lena’s eyes search hers: “You don’t believe me.” She sounds surprised.

“It’s just not…” she shakes her head. “You were there, you know. Nothing about that response could in any shape or form be labelled a success.”

“Mhhmhh. The Post, the Times, Newsweek, Time Magazine, CatCo,” she counts them off on her fingers “The Economist, too, just to mention a few, would all beg to differ.”

This is not where she imagined their first conversation would go. Is Lena taking the piss out of her? “What are you talking about?”

“You don’t know?” She taps away on her phone before continuing: “Here: they looked at the number of civilian and responder casualties in the immediate aftermath and in the medium term, in a number of cities across the US. New York, LA, Boston, Chicago, the list goes on. They compared it with total population and pre-Snap levels of criminality. They also looked at deaths and injuries among particularly vulnerable groups: ethnic minorities, Aliens… National City came out on top. And by a significant statistical margin at that. If I remember well, among the many reasons they identified for its success were smooth inter-service collaboration and less trigger-happy law enforcement on the ground.”

She’s so thrown, she finds herself unable to formulate a response. 

“That was your theatre of operations, was it not? You were the one in charge. You must have done something right.” 

She’s not sure she did something right. (She knows for a fact she did plenty wrong. And so does Lena.)

“That’s… » Is this for real? « I’ve never heard any of this before… This was in the papers?” She needs to get her hands on one of these articles. 

“I’ll have Jess send you the compilation.”

So Jess is still around. She’s glad Lena’s had this trusted presence by her side all this time.

“Thanks.”

“It’s no trouble: credit to where credit is due.” Lena looks around with feigned detachment: “Is your number still the same, I wonder?”

Ouch. Alex sighs: “Yeah… about that…”

“No need. So, I hear you’re the one who recommended me for this?”

The change in topic of conversation is quite abrupt. “Guilty as charged.”

She cocks her head: “I’m curious: was I plan A or Plan B?”

Alex looks sheepish: “Plan C actually…”

It’s not exactly a winning sales pitch, but it feels healthier to start with the truth. And something tells her playing hard to get may just be the way to go, to win Lena over.

It seems to work, too: Lena doesn’t look offended, more amused, if anything. Her eyes circle back to her: “Way to make a girl feel special, Agent.”

“Alex” she corrects on autopilot. She doesn’t deserve to be associated with law enforcement anymore. 

“Alex” Lena replies, with a certain inflection to it Alex finds she could get used to.

“Thank you for agreeing to come.”

Something changes then, in the room, in the air between them. Alex’s startled by how sincere Lena looks, when she replies: “Thank you for thinking of me.”

She has the sudden urge to break eye contact, feels too uncomfortable… too exposed. “So, what did you think of the machine? Are you in?”

Lena pushes away from the doorframe, only now fully stepping in and walks slowly around the room. She stops to pick up an old black pager, scrutinising it. “You’re certainly… thinking outside of the box. Who else knows about this?”

“Us. I mean, everyone you met today: Natasha – that’s Natasha Romanoff, Black Widow – Cap – Steven Rogers aka Captain America – Bruce Banner – the Hulk – Scott Lang – otherwise known as Ant man. James Rhodes and Tony Stark as well. That’s pretty much it.” Hook.

She makes no effort to hide her distaste: “Stark?”

“Uhm, yeah, we… We went to him first.”

“Of course you did. Plan A. Let me guess: he turned you down” Lena deduces, mulling this new piece of information over.

“He did.”

“Now why would Stark decline?”

Alex shrugs: “He’s got a good thing going. But mostly, he doesn’t believe it can be done. Something about the German proposition?” And sinker.

“The German proposition? The German… Oh, you mean the Deutsch proposition.”

“Yeah, that one.”

“It does indeed look impossible and yet…” Lena purses her lips. “Is Stark Enterprises benefiting from this in any way?”

What an odd question, maybe the media haven’t blown the famed rivalry between Lena and Stark that out of proportion. “Negative. I mean: it’s not. Well, ok… this is all built on Tony Stark’s property. And we’re using a lot of his equipment. But that’s it. He… he’s not involved.”

Lena lifts an eyebrow: “No intellectual property rights agreement in place or in the works?”

“You mean Stark Enterprises, with the Avengers? No. I can check, if you’d like, but I’m sure not. We don’t even have a lease agreement for the land, let alone anything else.”

“How involved is the government?”

Good question. She used to think the US government was all cognizant. Now… not so much. “I doubt they’re aware. We first want to see how realistic this whole thing is. That’s kind of where you and Bruce Banner come in. We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, I guess.”

Lena hums, places the pager back down and turns back towards her: “How did we first meet?”

“Sorry?”

“I’ve been misled in the past,” she explains, eyes clouding over, “been manipulated into helping… unsavoury people with nefarious plots: the Daxamite invasion,” a pause “Lex... Sadly, the list goes on. Alexandra Danvers knows that. I’d like to make sure…”

“Oh, that I’m really me and that this is legit? Ugh, right. Sure. We, well, we met a couple of years ago. I don’t think I’ll ever forget it: you saved my life.”

Lena regards her for a beat with searching eyes. They soften imperceptibly: “You and I remember our first introduction quite differently, then.” 

“What do you mean?”

“I was pretty certain it was the other way around: you rescued me.” 

“That’s how it usually goes, yeah. But not that day… Not with you.“

Lena looks intrigued, before she switches gears: “And where was that?”

“You mean physically?” She tries to remember: “At an event. Outdoors. It was a ceremony to rename L-Corp. One minute I was in control, the next he was taking aim at point-blank range. Then… Then Supergirl arrived. He threatened to pull the trigger. If you hadn’t shot him, I have no doubt he would have.”

There’s a flash of something hard in Lena’s eyes. “Thank you for humouring me.” The words are polite, but her tone’s veered cold.

Alex shrugs: “I get it. It’s hard not to be a little bit paranoid these days. I think this is the real deal though. And, for the record, I hope you know I’d never try and manipulate you. That’s not how I do things, it’s not who I am.”

“That’s both kind and naive of you to say.” She pauses with a faraway look. “I’ve come to understand that sadly, with the right incentive, we’d all be that person.”  

“Do I take it that you think we’ve got a shot at this?”

“I will not sign a contract. Not with the government, not with the Avengers, not with anyone. My research, my tech, are my own.”

They had had a similar exchange what feels like a lifetime ago, when they’d first discovered Lena’s experiments on Sam. L-Corp had ended up collaborating with the DEO later on for the Harun-El serum. “I’m not the one calling the shots here, but I’m pretty sure we can work with that. Like I said: I don’t work for the government anymore and neither do the Avengers.”

“And my involvement can’t become public knowledge. At least for the time being.”

“Sure.”

“Third choice you say?” Lena asks with a growing smirk.

Alex suddenly feels bold: “Prove us wrong.”

“Alex Danvers! You do know how to talk to women. Maybe there’s hope for you yet.”

“So that’s a yes, right?” she presses, ignoring the blush creeping up from her neck. 

“Well, I do like a challenge. What are your plans?”

“My plans?”

“Will you be around?”

“Oh, yeah. I sort of…” she looks around  « live here now.” She frowns: “I think. So yeah.”

Where else would she go? Besides, it’s the first real shot they have at fixing everything. Right here is where she needs to be. 

“Good. Then I look forward to working together again.”

And with that, Lena turns around and walks out. 

“Oh, uh, Lena?” Alex calls after her, the name falling naturally from her lips. “One more thing.”

“Yes?”

“About the… About that day… You know. What you saw” she hedges. “What you… Uhh… What you know.”

To her relief, Lena helps her out: “Are you perchance referring to Tokyo?”

“Yes. Yes, exactly: about Tokyo. I… Uhm…” she throws a nervous look to the monitors. “Nobody here knows. And… Uhh…”

“And you’d like to keep it that way” Lena fills in for her.

“I… yes. Please. At least for now.”

“Your secret’s safe with me, Alex.”

She lets out the breath she hadn’t realised she was holding. For some reason, there’s no doubt in her mind she can trust her.