Stars Will Fall
Lena’s eyes are still red-rimmed and wet when the DEO storms into her brother's old hideout in Mount Norquay. She flinches at the sound of the door being blown off its hinges, leaving a thin layer of smoke in the air.
Alex Danvers is leading the charge, J’onn J’onzz and four DEO agents behind her as she strides angrily up to Lena.
Lena feels like a sheep surrounded by wolves. “How did you get in here?”
Alex radiates pure rage, the look in her eyes is vengeful. She grabs Lena’s arm, harshly yanking her forward.
“Where is she?!”
Instinctively, Lena yanks her arm free from Alex’s vicious grasp and she steps back, putting a safe distance between her and the agent.
“Lay your hands on me one more time, Alex, and I swear—” Lena starts, but before she can finish, Alex has her gun drawn, aiming it right at Lena’s chest. Lena’s heart stops momentarily and she can barely hear the voice of J’onn ordering Alex to stand down over the sound of her own blood pulsing through her skull, pounding.
“What have you done to Kara?!” Alex shouts, her tone accusing. She clenches her jaw and her grip on the weapon tightens. “I should’ve known to never trust a Luthor,” she snarls.
Lena’s mouth falls agape as she struggles to process Alex’s words. She scoffs, takes another step back. Alex cocks her gun and J’onn starts shouting orders again.
“I’m not going to ask again,” Alex says, quieter this time, having gained her composure, and Lena could sense the moment Alex’s mindset shifted from sister to soldier. The hairs on Lena’s neck prickle, because while Alex Danvers may not be a killer, Lena knew with certainty that Agent Danvers is.
“Alex, stand down!” J’onn orders, yet the look in his eyes suggests that he is just as enraged as Alex.
“She’s done something to Kara,” Alex says, her glare fixed on Lena.
J’onn steps closer to the two women, attempting to ease the tension. “Alex, this isn’t the way. Lower your gun, now.”
Alex’s hardened expression falters. She releases a shaky breath as her eyes begin to gloss over. “She has Kara,” she says in a whisper.
J’onn carefully places his hand on Alex’s arm. “We don’t know that. Let’s not make any rash decisions.”
Lena stays silent as she watches the interaction, still stunned by Alex’s behavior. Finally, Alex lowers her gun with a sigh and slips it into the holster on her waist.
“Now,” Lena begins, her voice not quite as demanding as she would like it to be, “Does someone want to explain to me what’s going on?”
J’onn takes a wary step forward towards Lena. “Supergirl's whereabouts are unknown and we have reason to believe you are somehow involved.”
Lena furrows her brows. “What?”
“Don’t play dumb,” Alex snaps. “I remember when Kara told me that she had finally revealed herself to you as Supergirl. I remember thinking that your reaction to that information was too good to be true, because I was so sure that you’d hate her for lying to you for so long.”
J’onn exhales deeply. “Alex, let’s not—”
“No,” she says sternly, cutting him off without ever taking her eyes off Lena. “When we couldn’t reach Kara on comms I just knew that something was wrong, and the fact that I knew she was alone with you only convinced me even more that you were up to something.”
Lena struggles to maintain her neutral expression, and when she realizes where Alex is going with this she has to dig her nails deep into the soft skin of her palms to stop the panic in her chest from growing even more.
While there may be a handful of things that don’t make sense at the moment, Lena does know one thing: Kara is missing.
And that scares her terribly. A part of her knows that it shouldn’t, because Kara isn’t worth worrying over— not anymore. But there’s this other part of her. A tiny little sliver of her soul that she’s managed to keep tucked away ever since Lex told her the truth. Except this tiny little sliver isn’t so tiny after all, and now, as Lena recognizes the expression on Alex’s face for what it really is - not hatred or distrust or malice, but fear - it becomes clear to her that the sliver is infinitely larger than she realized.
That sliver is Kara. Every smile, every tear, every laugh, every joke, every argument— all of it is Kara, and Lena hates that.
“What are you saying?” Lena asks, though she already knows the answer.
Alex’s eyes darken. “Someone reprogrammed the Fortresses defense system to target Supergirl. That was you, am I wrong?”
Lena swallows nervously. “It was me, yes. I needed Myriad, and I did what I had to do to get it.”
J’onn is the one to speak up next. “You trapped her in there with kryptonite.”
Lena nods hesitantly. Guilt floods her body at the mention of the kryptonite. She ignores it.
“Then what?” J’onn asks, his body stiff, as if he’s preparing to hear a detailed description of what it was like when Lena watched the life drain from Kara’s body.
“I left. That’s it. There is nothing more to it, I swear ,” she says in defense, hoping the tremble in her voice doesn’t reveal just how thin of a thread she’s hanging on by. But then she speaks again, and everything she’s been trying to hide is made known by the way her bottom lip quivers. “She’s gone?”
“Yes,” Alex says somberly. Then, she studies Lena for a few moments before, finally, her expression softens. “You really don’t know anything about this?”
Lena shakes her head. “I swear.”
Suddenly Alex turns around, let’s her head fall in defeat, and begins to sob. J’onn wastes no time in putting a comforting hand on her back.
“Fuck,” Alex cries through gritted teeth. “This is bad.”
“What is it? What aren’t you telling me?” Lena asks.
J’onn glances at Lena, frustration etched into his features. “There was blood… at the Fortress. A lot of it. Kara put up a fight, but whoever it was against… they won. With the amount of blood we saw, we’re not even sure if she…”
He trails off, deciding that with Alex breaking down at his side that it’s best not to suggest something so morbid. But Lena couldn’t help but wonder the same thing.
What are the chances that Kara is even alive ?
The idea of Kara being dead is like a physical blow and Lena suddenly feels a wave of nausea wash over her and her body goes cold. She counts down from ten in her head, inhaling and exhaling for every second until her breathing is under control.
“I want to help,” Lena says, hoping she doesn’t sound too shaken up. “You’re right, a part of me hates Kara for what she did, but the world needs her.”
I need her , she wants to say. She stops herself.
“Let me help you find her,” she says instead, desperate, pleading. “ Please .”
J’onn and Alex share a look, and it’s as if they’re having a whole conversation without saying a single word. Finally, J’onn nods.
“Your assistance would be greatly appreciated, Miss Luthor,” he says. “Actually, there is something specific that you might be able to help us with.”
J’onn pulls out a tablet, taps on the screen a few times before turning it over to face Lena. Displayed on the screen is a photo of the inside of the Fortress. Lena sees the kryptonite-laced structure which she had trapped Kara in; it’s completely demolished, shattered pieces spread across the ground.
Her heart stops when she sees the blood. It’s in puddles on the floor, streaks across the walls, handprints. Kara’s hands, Lena can tell, because she has spent so much time looking at them, holding them, squeezing them, that she’s sure she would be able to pick out Kara’s handprint in a room full of a hundred others.
Kara’s hands are small, her fingers slender. Her nails are always manicured, and occasionally they’ll be painted and Lena can always tell when Kara paints her own nails because she always gets a little bit of nail polish on her cuticles.
The last thing Lena notices on the screen is a symbol, drawn on the ground in what Lena can assume is Kara’s blood. She recognizes it instantly.
“Cadmus?” she asks in disbelief, looking up at J’onn. “No, no, that’s not possible.”
J’onn sighs. “So it’s true, then. Lillian got out, Cadmus is back.”
Lena shakes her head. A wave of dizziness washes over her and she needs to brace herself against a table to keep from falling over.
“This doesn’t make any sense,” Lena mutters, pinching the bridge of her nose. “How could this… how could…”
“Lena,” Alex says, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Lillian is back. We just got word that she escaped from her holding facility, but we didn’t have time to look into it because we were already on our way to look for Kara. But this symbol— this proves that Cadmus is active again. There’s no one that knows Lillian better than you do.”
“I— I can’t…” Lena trails off.
I can’t do this, she thinks. Kara is gone.
“Lena, we need you with us,” Alex says, harder this time. “You said you wanted to help.”
“I do!” Lena shouts. Then, quietly, “I do.”
Alex steps back, placing herself at J’onn’s side.
“Then prove it,” Alex says, her resolve now strengthened. “We need you with us.”
”Okay,” Lena breathes. There is a tremor in her voice. “I’m with you.”
Kara jolts awake. Her heart pounds in her chest, vibrating against her ribs. It won’t slow. She tries to breathe. Inhale, exhale. There’s something in her throat. A breathing tube?
She’s lying down. There’s a light on the ceiling, right above her head. It's red and it’s blinding. She turns away, squints her eyes. She’s not at the DEO. If she were, Alex would be at her side, interlacing their hands, wiping the tears that were slipping from Kara’s eyes.
She’s crying now. Not out of fear, she realizes, but out of pain.
“You’re alright,” a voice says, startling Kara. It’s a man. His voice is hauntingly calm and Kara can tell that he’s not actually in the room with her, but rather speaking to her over an intercom. “It won’t be much longer. Just try and stay calm, alright?”
Kara cries harder, shakes her head. Everything hurts. She wants to go home.
“Supergirl, breathe,” the man says softly. “I know this must be difficult for you, but I have my best mechanics already working on something to fix you.”
Fix her? What is he talking about? She’s too panicked to ponder the question for very long. Instead, she tugs fruitlessly at the bounds on her wrists and ankles. She can feel more restraints against her abdomen, but she is still too weak to lift her head so she can’t be sure how many there are.
It wouldn’t matter, she thinks. It wouldn’t matter if she was being held down by a thousand chains or just a singular zip tie because she feels just that weak.
She gives up, eventually, letting her body go completely limp. Her eyes flutter shut and she slips into unconsciousness.
When she wakes, there is a man at her side. She wonders if he is the same one who was speaking to her before. He hovers over her, his head blocking the overhead light. Kara can see now. The man is wearing a surgical mask and scrubs. He’s looking at her strangely, analyzing her. His eyes wrinkle and he chuckles.
“You’re awake, Miss Danvers,” he says, his voice gruff. “Perfect timing. The surgery is just about to begin.”
Her eyebrows furrow. She wants to speak but that stupid tube is still in her mouth. Instead, she makes a small, scared noise that sounds somewhere between a whimper and a gasp.
The man hears, releases a sigh.
“Don’t be afraid,” he whispers. He brushes the back of his hand against Kara’s cheek. It does nothing to soothe her.
He turns away. Kara hears the clatter of metal against metal. She tries to lift her head and barely succeeds. She watches the man sift through a tray of tools before he picks up a scalpel. He notices Kara’s eyes on him and turns to face her.
“You’ve never had surgery, have you? You’ve probably never even felt the prick of a needle.” He frowns and his eyes darken sadistically. “Humans are usually given anesthesia during procedures like this, but because of your biology, I'm afraid that isn’t an option.”
Kara can’t think straight. The pain is so intense that the man’s words don’t even register to her. She has no idea what is coming.
“I offered to develop a substance that would act as anesthesia so that you wouldn’t have to suffer, but Miss Luthor said that wasn’t necessary,” he says quietly. “She’s very excited about this project, as am I.”
Lena? Kara’s breathing speeds up and she has to squeeze her eyes shut to keep from hyperventilating. He’s lying, she thinks. Lena wouldn’t do this to her.
Right?
The man steps away and returns a moment later. He’s standing over her again, a syringe filled with a mysterious blue liquid in his hand.
“This,” he says, “is a paralyzing agent. I need you to be completely still during the surgery, and this serum will do just that. Unfortunately, it will do nothing to relieve you of your pain.”
He taps the side of the syringe a few times, watching as the bubbles in the liquid settle. Kara watches the man closely, her eyes following his movements as he brings the syringe to her neck.
She looks down at her body, dressed in a thin hospital gown and littered with bruises and cuts. The injuries are minor, so it makes no sense to her why she’s in so much pain.
Then she sees it.
Her breath hitches and her pupils narrow to a pinprick as she looks down in horror at the mess of gauze and bandages wrapped around her left arm, severed at the elbow. Blood soaks through the wrap and onto the cold metal table beneath her.
The world stops, and any composure that Kara had been holding onto breaks away completely and leaves her sobbing. Nothing makes sense. She doesn't know how she got here, or how long it’s been. She has faith that there’s already a team of agents looking for her, scouring high and low to find their symbol of hope.
She thinks of her sister. God, she must be a mess. The DEO can become the most dreadful place on Earth when Kara is in danger, because Alex loses her fucking mind every time, and it’s as if all the training she’s had as a soldier falls away and she’s left as this fragile, terrified hull of a person.
Kara can’t even imagine what it will look like when the DEO storms into wherever she’s being held and sees what has been done to her.
Kara doesn’t know it now, but assuming that she would be saved was her first mistake.
There’s a pinch in her neck and almost immediately she feels the effects of the serum. All that she can move are her eyes. Everything else is locked in place, frozen. There is nothing peaceful about it.
“I will begin now,” the man says, sounding almost sorry. “I do have to warn you, this will be messy.”
Kara can do nothing but watch as the man picks up a bone saw from his tray of tools, takes a moment to study the sharp ridges of the blade, his eyes glossing over with an almost psychotic look of fascination before he lowers the saw to her shoulder.
The pain is immediate and unforgiving. Kara needs to scream but she can’t. There is a tube in her throat and poison in her body. She prays that the squelching sound of her skin and muscles being ripped combined with the pure agony burning through her nervous system is enough to make her pass out.
It isn’t, and for half an hour she has no choice but to endure.
Finally, there is silence. The cutting has stopped. She opens her eyes, and all it takes is one look at her severed arm for her brain to show her mercy and send her into a state of unconsciousness.
The last thing she remembers before she shuts her eyes is praying to Rao that she won’t wake up.