Chapter Text
After the vault she found hidden half a mile under a burnt out oil refinery in North Dakota, Lena thought she would stop being surprised by Lex’s paranoia and wild distribution of his assets.
She was wrong.
It wasn’t that she had lied to the DEO, not exactly. Lex did keep a vault in the lab. He just also kept one in a mountain range outside National City, one in the sub basement of an L-Corp subsidiary in Japan, and now--apparently--one stashed behind the walk-in cooler of a New York deli…
Her research suggested at least a dozen more secret labs located across the globe, but Lena was doing her best to work from most concerning to least. As she’d told Supergirl, she’d inherited Lex’s assets, for good or for ill, and it was about time she had an accurate inventory of exactly what those assets entalled.
Like the various alien plague virus samples Lena’s assistants were currently boxing into a vacuum-sealed shipping container for transport back to National City.
Got an interesting one for you today, ETA 1600 , Lena types, shooting off a text to Winn. Whether she likes it or not, some of Lex’s ‘assets’ have required DEO collaboration to deal with safely. Lena doesn’t fancy her lab being ground zero for a Llaran pox outbreak when she tries to incinerate the virus cultures.
So collaboration it is.
[Winn Schott]: Yesssss u bring the best gifts
[Winn Schott]: Should i rally the team?
[Lena Luthor]: No, that shouldn’t be necessary.
[Lena Luthor]: You and I should be able to handle this one, with the right resources.
[Winn Schott]: Righty oh, science partner :)
The telltale hiss of the L-Corp security box hermetically sealing itself sifts itself over Lena’s eardrums. She tucks her phone into the safety of her bag and watches as the container is carefully lifted into the back of the truck.
“Just the big one left, Miss Luthor,” her assistant tells her, nodding as he passes on his way back into the vault while his colleague straps in their other assets for transport.
“Thanks, Ryan,” she returns, thumb pushing up the plastic bridge of her safety glasses up her nose. She reaches for her tablet, balancing it on the palm of her hand as she brings up Lex’s inventory list and the corresponding files she has (or hasn’t) been able to track down.
“‘Inventory location NR31,’” she reads as her second assistant steps into the vault behind the first. “‘Space brain of unknown origin.’”
Her eyebrow raises. Space brain? She pictures the formalin-preserved specimens of her education; did Lex acquire an alien brain for the purposes of anatomical study?
(How did he ‘acquire’ it in the first place? she can’t help but wonder….)
“Let’s take this one as a team move, please, gentleman,” she calls into the vault, receiving a pair of affirmative acknowledgements back in return.
With their lab coats buttoned high and thick rubber gloves pulled up to their elbows, the men return wheeling a cart, a thick black plastic casing over the top with Lex’s signature labelling system neatly printed on the top.
Non-carbon based organic specimen. Light sensitive. Living, as of… Lena references the open chart on her tablet… 2008??
“Eric, switch us over to red light only, please,” she says, brows furrowed as she pulls down the tablet menu to filter her device’s own blue LED light.
With the faint click of the switch, the room is plunged into relative darkness. Nothing but the soft orange glow of her tablet illuminates the small room before a lamp is switched on, the red bulb coating the room in its dim light.
Eric holds the singular bulb aloft as Ryan readies to lift away the dark plastic shield from the supposed brain. With slow, steady movements, the case is removed and Lena’s eyes scour the specimen, heart hammering in her chest as lays first eyes on the pulsing tissue.
For all its size, Lena’s first observation is that the brain is incredibly human -looking. Suspended in a glass orb, it bobs gently a solid four inches from each edge of the glass, and the sheer absurdity of it -- no stasis fluid, no discernible method of preservation or system to maintain life -- has Lena’s finger trembling as she taps to initiate video recording on her tablet and begins to circle the bench.
“The specimen appears humanoid on first glance,” she says, taking slow, measured steps around the bench. “Deep sulci and gyri with a greyish cast seem to mimic the human cerebral cortex.”
Her eyebrows furrow as she continues walking, stepping closer to the glass to get a clearer image in the dark, filtered light.
“Where the human brain contains two obvious hemisphere, NR31 seems to contain four,” Lena says. “It appears a near-perfect sphere…. No obvious brain stem or connection into a larger central nervous system is apparent on visual inspection.”
Lena snaps a few still photographs while her own mind goes into overdrive.
Lena has always been a physicist, an engineer first and foremost, but being raised a Luthor meant studying the biological sciences, as well. And for all her exposure to medicine and biochemistry and aliens and alien hatred…. Lena finds herself wholly unprepared to comprehend a life form that maintains higher cognitive function without the aid of a central nervous system.
Superman, Supergirl, the Daxamites…. They’re human, on the surface. Lena has seen some of Supergirl’s fights with little green men broadcast across National City’s evening news, but even when their skins were grey or they projectile vomited an acid goo, the beings were recognizable as lifeforms. They had a head to house their brains, two (or more) structures to house eyes for sensing the environment. They moved with limbs and all of their body parts were attached to one form.
This , however….
This brain suggested a life form with no central nervous system. Had Lex acquired the brain from a lifeforms that housed its brain suspended within its own skull, much like it floated in the glass? Was the brain the entirety of the being itself?
Was even Lena’s considerable intellect too lacking in creativity imagine such a being at all?
Oh, Lex, she thinks, a familiar weight settling heavy in the space around her heart. What marvels could you have shown the world if you hadn’t succumbed to the path of madness?
She’s broken from her thoughts by a flicker in the glass, a glint in the shine of it. Lena’s head swirls to find the unchecked source of light, mouth halfway around the order for Ryan to put the case back on the specimen, now , but no….
The flicker flashes again, catches her eye like a blip of static under the covers at night.
Is that…?
Lena bends in to look closer, tablet held lamely in her hand as her eyes squint to trace the path of a faint blue grow as it jitters across the smooth, wavy surface.
“Miss Luthor?” she hears, but the words feel distant, important in the face of this . A second flash joins the first one, a green spark that titters in the direction of the first blip, almost reaching out….
“Miss Luthor, I think maybe you should step away from that….”
“Quiet, Eric.”
The green spark is born again, its filament-like reach nearly touching the blue this time. Lena watches, almost rooting for it as a third attempt is made….
The two sparks meet, Lena’s face bathed in a flash of purple colliding light before the world spins on its axis before everything goes dark.
Lena falls.
--------------------
Her forehead crumples as she blinks under the harsh overhead lighting. There’s an ache that starts right between her eyebrows and wraps around to press vice-like at the soft spots of her temples.
“Miss Luthor? Lena, can you hear me?”
Throat rumbling, Lena makes a noise somewhere between a question and assent, squeezing her eyes shut under the assaulting lights.
“Bright…” she mutters turning her head to the side and groaning with the wave of nausea that rolls over here.
“Just a second, sweetheart, let me turn down the lights,” the voice assures her, quieter this time. There’s a gentle shuffling at her side, the squeak of tight wheels rolling on laminate floors before the whir of the overhead light ends and a dimmer, soft light takes its place at the head of her bed.
“Ugh, fucking hazelnut,” comes another voice, deeper and curled with disgust, as Lena struggles to open her eyes, blinking quick to settle the blur from them.
“There, that should be better,” the first voice says. “I’m Annie, I’m a nurse. You’re at New York Presbyterian Hospital, Miss Luthor. Are you in any pain?”
“Will Emma get mad if I pick a blue cast?” asks a smaller voice, a child’s, and Lena’s eyes scour the room for the source as her surroundings begin to fill in her vision.
“Um.” Swallowing thick, Lena tries to bat about the cobwebs from her mind, taking in the soft blue of the hospital room, the IV pole, the beep beep beep of the monitoring equipment placed around her. “My head….”
“On a scale from 1 to 10, how would you rate the pain?”
This time Lena can place the voice to the nurse at her side, a woman adjusting the settings on her IV pump machine.
“Maybe a 6?” Lena says, forcing herself to swallow back a mouthful of saliva that pools under her tongue, in her cheeks. Her stomach flips and she tells the nurse, “I’m really very nauseous, though.”
“Alright, I’ve got some zofran for you right here, lets get that in you,” the nurse tells her kindly, reaching for a syringe on the top of her workstation.
“Bitch.”
Lena’s head picks up. “Excuse me?!”
“Sorry, dear?” the nurse asks, uncapping the anti-emetic as she moves towards Lena’s bedside.
“You just said….” Lena’s brow furrows, the young woman’s face devoid of anything behind the clinical compassion of a nurse for her patient. “I’m sorry, I thought I heard you say something.
“Might have been someone out in the hall,” Annie says, smiling. “This is a busy ward today.”
“Yeah….”
Annie reaches for her IV line, finding an orange capped port and untwisting the cap before twisting on the syringe. “Here we go, this should get you feeling a little better. I’ve got an order for pain meds I can go grab now that you’re awake, too.”
“Thank you,” Lena says, quiet, shoulders relaxing back into the unforgiving mattress. “Um… Do you know what exactly happened?”
“Seems you managed to get yourself electrocuted at work,” Annie tells her, tossing the empty syringe into the trash can before she puts the port cap back on Lena’s line.
That seems... the most appropriate explanation, Lena supposes, considering the circumstances. “And my employees, Eric and Ryan, are they….?”
“Dismissed a few hours ago,” Annie assures her with a soft smile. “Neither of them seemed to sustain any injuries, but we checked them out just in case. I believe a young woman just arrived a little while ago to see you. Jessica? Should I call down to the waiting room to tell her you’re awake?”
“Jess,” Lena says, looking up at her. How long was she unconscious??? “Yes, please. I’d like to see her.”
“Sure thing,” she agrees. “I’ll let her know and come back in a few minutes with your pain medicine, okay?”
“Thank you.”
The nurse gathers the last of her things before seeing herself out with a quiet click of the door behind her. As soon as she’s alone, Lena lets out a breath, her monitor ticking up as her heart rate picks up and she presses the heels of her palms into the hollows of her eye sockets.
What the hell happened to her in that vault?
Flickers of blue and green and a bright pulse of light skip across her mind’s eye, and hours later (hours, yes... Exactly how many had she lost to this?) she can question her own draw to the brain with more rational hindsight.
She shouldn’t have been so intrigued, should she? While interesting, certainly, a brain was hardly the most exotic or concerning one of the Lex’s possessions. But that light…. She’d seen it and she’d had to see more ---.
“God, does everything take three hours around here or what?”
Lena flinches as she hears the voice, masculine and unfamiliar, close enough to be standing right beside her. But her eyes scan the room, wild, and she finds herself decidedly alone.
“Hello…?” she calls cautious, quiet, her cheeks burning with the sheer absurdity of calling out to an empty room.
“Amazing how many people are allergic to everything but opiates these days.”
“I’m so hungry.”
“Jesus, Steve. Shut up for five minutes and let the doctor talk.”
“It’s serious this time. I know it is. I can tell what they’re not telling me.”
Heartbeat thumping in her chest, Lena brings her fingers to her temples, rubs at the tense muscles.
No one is here , she reminds herself. She’s alone in her room. Therefore, logic dictates that the voices must be coming from the outside hall.
“I hate needles, hate needles, hate needles! Owwwwww!”
So why the hell do they sound so close ???
“----Miss Luthor?”
The familiar tone of Jess cutting through the chaos, Lena’s eyes snap up to meet worried ones, and her breath rushes out with the relief of seeing a source of the voice she can so clearly hear.
“Jess,” she says, blinking quick. “Thank God. Please, come in.”
“How are you feeling?” Jess asks, concerned as she slips into the room. “I tried to get here sooner, but with the jet already in New York, I had to book a commercial flight, and you know those take forever….”
“It’s alright,” Lena assures her. “Please, sit. I have to say, I just woke up and everything’s a bit… much , right now.”
With her eyebrows furrowed, Jess nods at her in sympathy, taking the offered seat and pulling an L-Corp tablet from her bag.
“The doctors gave me your belongings; your phone was fried,” she says, powering up the tablet before handing it over to Lena. “I called headquarters to transfer your backup to a new one. It should be waiting for you when we get back.”
“Thank you,” Lena says softly. “I assume my tablet was lost, as well?”
Jess nods, apology woven in the scrunch of her nose. “I spoke to Eric and Ryan before they left. They’re gonna send me their depositions in the morning. We contacted the NYPD and the backup team should be securing the rest of the vault now. They told me about the… brain.”
Lena sighs, fingertip resting on the home button to unlock the tablet. She winces at the pain that twinges at the back of her eyes as the screen opens, and immediately moves to turn the brightness down, down, down….
“What kind of brain shoots electricity at people anyway?”
“Lex’s file just said ‘space brain,’” Lena answers, eyes squinting at the offensive contrast of the LED screen as she pulls up her remote phone application. “I don’t know what the hell actually happened; I hope some of the equipment was far enough away to get a clean read without interference.”
“I’ll have the team take a look ASAP,” Jess says, finger sliding across her own phone screen as she makes the note.
Lena sighs, the breath working from the bottom of her lungs to clear her of its weight.
Winn Schott, 7 missed texts, 3 missed calls, 2 voicemails.
Alex Danvers, 2 missed texts, 2 missed calls, 1 voicemail.
Kara Danvers, 24 missed texts, 6 missed calls, 6 voicemails.
Her eyes flick to the top of the screen and the small black bar that displays 1:23 AM in white block letters.
“What??” Lena pulls down the menu bar, blinking to make sure her eyes aren’t deceiving her.
“Miss Luthor?”
“It’s one in the morning?!” she says, half statement half question, and Jess’ brows pinch in the middle.
“They said you were unconscious for quite some time,” she says, and Lena recognizes the tone, the same way it levels to tell her an unfortunate business associate is awaiting her arrival. “Apparently you were brought in just before noon.”
Lena tears her eyes away, to the curtained window that hides any view of the outside world from her room. Between the ache in her head and dizziness upon her waking…. “I guess I hadn’t realized.”
“I’m sure you’ll get your bearings back soon,” Jess says softly. “I hope so. L-Corp would be nothing without her.”
Lena lets out a scrape of a chuckle at that, turning to her assistant with confusion in the lift of her brow. “Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I’m sure there are plenty of people who would violently disagree with you.”
“The doctors said you’re expected to make a full recovery,” Jess returns.
“I meant they would disagree with you about L-Corp,” Lena says, pulling up her email app to scan through the senders and titles.
“I didn’t say anything about L-Corp.”
This time it’s Lena’s brow that furrows. “Yes, you did. You just said ‘L-Corp would be nothing without her.’”
Jess furrows her brows. “No, I didn’t.”
“Yes, you did,” Lena repeats, looking at her assistant. “I heard you.”
Jess shakes her head. “No, Miss Luthor. I didn’t say that. But I did sort of think it?"
“What do you mean you ‘sort of ’ thought it?” Lena asks, her voice more demanding than she intends it to be. “You said it, Jess, I heard you.”
“Can you still hear me? ”
“Of course, I can!” Lena replied, huffing out a breath. Her heart rate monitor was beginning to tick up and her headache was increasing until her temples began to throb. “I’m concussed, not deaf.”
“Miss Luthor.” It’s Jessica’s gentle tone that calls Lena’s gaze back toward her. “ I’m not saying anything .”
Lena blinks, squeezing her eyes shut when it looks like Jess’ mouth doesn’t move at all. “What---? I don’t---?”
“I’m thinking it. ”
The metered beep of the monitor at her bedside ticks up again, sets off an alarm, and it’s enough to jolt Lena from her frozen position, head dizzy and the room spinning as Annie comes back in and presses a few buttons to silence that.
“Well, just what is going on in here to get you all worked up?” Annie asks, looking between the two women.
“I’m sorry, I’m afraid I got talking too much about work too soon,” Jess apologies smoothly. “I promise that’s it for the work talk tonight.”
Annie’s expression softens, smiling at Lena when she nods, swallows thick.
“Well,” she says, pulling a syringe and a small IV bag out of her scrubs. “Let’s see that you do, and see if these pain meds help you get some rest, hmm, Miss Luthor?”
“Thank you,” she says quietly, offering out her hand with the IV for the nurse to uncap a port and attach the small bag.
“This one’s your dilaudid, to help with the pain,” she says, hanging the bag and twisting a few nozzles to get the clear liquid flowing. “This second one here is phenergan. The dilaudid can make you pretty nauseous, and we don't want to give you too much zofran.”
Lena watches as she slowly presses down the syringe plunger and injects the medicine into Lena’s waiting veins.
“Thank you,” Lena says, feeling the first rush of medicine start to weigh down her limbs.
“Of course,” Annie tells her, twisting the orange port cap back into place on her wrist. “Now you try to get some rest, and I’ll be back in a few hours, alright? Hit your call button if you need anything in the meantime. I really need to pee. ”
“...I will. Thank you.”
“Get some rest, dear.”
The air in the room is thick between them in her nurse’s absence, but the warmth of the medicine helps to quiet the shroud of voices filling her head. Instead, she’s filled with a cottony kind of fuzziness, a weight on her eyelids that makes sleep seem to easy, so simple….
“Jess?” she says, tongue numb and lazy as she grapples with her hold on her own consciousness.
“Yes, Miss Luthor?” comes the dutiful reply.
“Please call…” Her weight sinks into the mattress beneath her. “Please call Dr. Reichardt. Tell him…. I need to see him as soon as I’m back in National City.”
“I will, Miss Luthor.”
Her eyelids droop, blur the room around her as she blinks. “Thanks. I'm glad... 'm glad you’re here.”
She forces her eyelids to open when she hears the scuff of a chair at the side of her bed. “Everything’s going to be okay, Miss Luthor. Just rest now. You’re not alone. ”
--------------------
They don’t speak about yesterday’s revelations in the morning. The daytime charge nurse, a tall man named Derek, comes in to relieve Annie before breakfast and inform Lena that she’s being discharged.
Despite the throbbing ache in her head and the constant stream of voices that she just can’t shut off , she’s sent on her way with a bottle of percocet and instructions to see her doctor back home as soon as she’s able to get in.
Jess leads them out of the hospital through the medical school rather than patient discharge, avoiding the crowds of patients and visitors.
Lena slips from the wheelchair into the waiting town car, trying to ignore the constant stream of Jessica’s thoughts as she hears the same few on repeat: “I’ve got to talk to her about this. I don’t know if Dr. Reichardt will know what to do. Maybe Miss Danvers? The agent one, I know she’s upset with Kara. Oh no, can she hear me right now???”
Lena really owes this poor woman a raise.
“Jess,” she says softly as her assistant slides in beside her, a bright pink bag reading Patient Belongings held on her lap. “It’s okay. We’ll talk on the plane.”
Her nod pulls some of the tension from Jess’ shoulders, but doesn’t calm her thoughts on the drive to the airport. Lena, for her part, rests her temple against the cool glass of the window, closes her eyes and tries to use every expensive therapy technique she’s ever learned to calm her mind and focus on her breath.
In - one, two, three…. Out - one, two three….
They turn down Broadway and the street crowds begin to thicken, the thoughts spilling over the general noise and bustle of upper Manhattan to scream like a roaring concert crowd in Lena’s ears.
Her fists clench in her lap, knuckles white where the skin pulls across her bones. She counts the seconds as they wait at a stop light, begging them to pass.
“Could you put on the radio, please?” she asks the driver, leaning forward to catch his attention. As the man nods and reaches for the nobs, Lena adds, “something classical, if you’ve got it.”
The flickering sounds of a radio being tuned scratch against her ears, but soon enough, the vibrato of violins and the twinkle of a piano come through the speaker. Resting her head against the headrest, Lena tries to drown herself in the sound of it. She focuses on the chords, the way the percussion syncopates with the bass line and the the soft flutter of a trilling flute sounding out over the rest of the orchestra.
“Miss Luthor, is there anything I can do?” Jess asks quietly at the same time Lena hears, “oh, I wish I could help her .”
It takes a moment for Lena to parse the two sentences apart amidst the chaos, and another for her to bring herself to shake her head.
“I’m just looking forward to getting home and getting some answers,” she says, offering what she hopes is a reassuring smile.
If the nervous smile Jess offers back is any indication, it’s not reassuring at all.
She’s nauseous with overstimulation and the start of a migraine by the time they reach LaGuardia, and despite her stubborn insistence that she’s fine , she doesn’t need anymore painkillers, she finds herself digging to the bottom of her bag halfway through pre-check for one of the round white tabs of Percocet to take the edge off her throbbing headache.
There has to be a solution to this. There has to be a fix.
Within twenty minutes of having their bags scanned, Jess and Lena board one of the L-Corp private jets, welcomed by their pilot for the flight, Thomas, and the attendant, Margaret.
“Would you like anything to drink before we take off, Miss Luthor?” Margaret asks as Lena settles her bags and takes her seat in one of the large leather flight chairs.
“I'd love a water, thank you,” she says with a small smile, despite her desire for a heavy glass of wine. What she would give to drown herself in a couple glasses of Merlot, recline her seat back once they hit altitude and sleep her way through the next six hours of fly time.... But alcohol and concussions do not mix, nor do opiates, and as much as she might welcome the quiet , she’s not willing to risk the seizures.
Not yet anyway.
With a cold bottle of water at her side and a cup of coffee for Jess, they settle in for takeoff. As the plane roars to life under them and the wheels lift from the ground, Lena lets out a breath.
There’s only four of them on this plane. Four people whose thoughts can slip over into hers, and the comparable silence of it has Lena’s shoulders slumping in relief. The pilot and his copilot are reviewing the flight status, their conversation and thoughts barely whispers over the roar of the engines. Jess’ thoughts are much louder, closer, but with just the two of them, it’s more conversation than screaming.
"Is it okay to ask or should I just…? I’ll let her take the lead….”
Lena turns to her assistant with a tug of her lips. “It’s okay, you can ask.”
“So it’s true?” Jess asks, eyes wide. “You can… You can hear my thoughts?”
“Everyone’s apparently,” she says, propping an elbow on her armrest and rubbing her fingers into the soft indent at her temple. “The ride to the airport was awful.”
“I could tell you were upset,” Jess says, voice softened with sympathy. “I've got to watch my thoughts. Nothing dirty around the boss. Or weird. Oh no, I’m doing it right now!”
Lena lets out a soft chuckle. “Don’t worry about it. It’s… going to take some getting used to for both of us. I’m hoping once we’re home, I’ll be able to get some answers. See how I can fix this.”
“What if you can’t?”
The thought comes quickly, too quickly for Jess to filter and Lena knows the same thought is already swimming in the back of her own head.
“Maybe… we should contact Alex Danvers?” Jess offers. “Or Mr. Schott? They might be able to help.”
“No, I don’t want to involve them, not yet,” Lena tells her with a wave of her hand. If she tells Alex, she tells Kara. If she tells Winn, she tells…. Probably James, and Alex, who tells Kara, and suddenly, everyone knows. “Let me get a handle of what’s going on and then I’ll seek out resources as I need them.”
“Yes, Miss Luthor.”
It isn’t long before Lena feels her head begin to droop, the effects of the Percocet weighing down her limbs and easing the pain behind her eyes. Reclining her chair enough to prevent a neck ache when she wakes, Lena closes her eyes and lets the white noise of a roaring 737 engine lull her to sleep.
--------------------
“Miss Luthor, we’re getting ready to start our descent.”
With heavy eyelids and a blurry gaze, Lena blinks herself awake. Lifting herself to return the chair to its upright position, she rubs gently at her eyes, yawning into her palm to ease the sleep from her bones. Jess is beside her packing up her laptop and padfolio, looking over to give Lena a soft smile.
“Did you sleep well?” she asks. “Those snores were cute.”
Lena feels her face heat and drops her gaze, eyes flickering around the cabin before they return to her assistant’s face. “Yes, yes I did. I’m sorry for snoring.”
Confusion contorts between Jessica’s brows before realizing dawns on her cheek. “Oh! I’m sorry. It wasn’t loud or anything, you just seemed really knocked out. It was endearing.”
Her words doing nothing to cool the flush in her cheeks and neck, Lena nods, tries to retain a fraction of her dignity as she says, “well. I do feel much better, so….”
She clears her throat, straightening her blouse and attempting to put some professionalism back between them. “Did you happen to get ahold of Dr. Reichardt?”
“Yes. He’s in San Diego today, but he said he will be back tomorrow and you have an appointment for two o’clock.”
“Thank you.”
“It’s no problem.”
A soft tone rings out to alert them to their final descent, and Margaret takes her place up front to buckle in. Lena watches National City come into view as they land, the square grids and city parks turning from abstract shapes to buildings to people and cars.
The bustle of the city assaults her ears before they even touch down.
“Jesus Christ it’s hot out here. Only two more hours until I’m off, two more hours….”
"God, can anyone ever get out of this airport without a delay?”
“Look! A big plane!!!”
“Wish I could jack off right now.”
As the brakes slow their plane to a halt, Lena measures her breath, tries to use the air to open up her lungs in counts of three.
Her heart races. Her head pounds.
It's so loud.
Someone trips on their way down the terminal and nearly screams about their utter embarrassment, Lena forced to listen to it from her place out on the runway.
She startles, flinching when Jess’ hand lands on her elbow.
“What?!” she bites, harder than intended.
Jess stares at her with wide eyes and Lena feels her gut fall to her lap. She didn't mean to snap, but her throat is tight, too tight, and her arm prickles where Jess touched her.
She can't breathe --- .
“Miss Luthor…. Are you okay? She doesn’t look okay…. ”
“I’m fine, I just….” Lena gasps for a breath and her lungs burn. Her heart clenches in her chest, hand coming up to press at the space between her ribs. “I’m just----.”
She tries to push herself to standing, but the world spins on its axis.
“It’s okay, stay sitting, Miss Luthor,” Jess tells her, hand back on her arm and Lena has to fight herself not to pull it away, not to snarl at her assistant and scream and tell her to just go back, take the plane back up, make it quiet, please -----.
“Should I get a doctor?” Margaret asks and Lena shakes her head. She doesn’t need a doctor, she needs everyone to stop talking, stop thinking, stop touching her.
“I don’t need a doctor,” she says, swallowing when her lungs burn for air. Breathe, Lena. You know the symptoms of a panic attack …. “Jess, call Alex Danvers. Tell her I…. Tell her I’m coming in.”
“I’m already here,” she hears, a familiar alto standing out from the jumble as the agent boards the plane. “You went out of communication with Winn yesterday; we came to make sure everything was okay.”
Lena nods. “I’m fine.”
Her jaw clenches and her teeth grind as her entire flight crew, assistant, and Alex Danvers stare at her.
“What the hell happened to her?”
“Can we have some room, please?” Lena bites out, looking at the others. “I’m fine , and Agent Danvers is a doctor.”
Reluctantly, the flight crew departs, and Lena lifts a hand to halt Jess when her assistant struggles with the decision of whether she should leave, too.
“What’s going on, Lena?” Alex asks, soft as she takes a seat beside her.
Dizzy, Lena feels trapped, her heart pounding for a way out of her chest, out of a body that refuses to be put back into her control.
“We were cataloging one of Lex’s vaults,” she says forcing the words through her too tight throat. “One of the items was a brain, something alien. I guess I got too close, or it touched me, or something , but I woke up ten hours later in the hospital, and now….”
She runs out of breath, out of courage to admit it. Her eyes blur and fill with tears and she hastily swipes at her cheek as one has the audacity to slip past her lash line.
“We should get you to the DEO to be examined,” Alex says, voice soft. “We can go over the details there.”
And as much as Lena wants to protest, doesn’t want the DEO or Supergirl near any of this, she knows, logically, rationally, that she can’t do her own examinations right now.
Not if she can’t hold herself together on the NCX tarmac, for Christ’s sake.
She forces herself to nod before she can lose the nerve.
“Maybe I should have Kara fly her there, she doesn’t look so good .”
Lena blinks. “What?"
“Do you think you handle the car ride?” Alex asks out loud. “Otherwise we can have Supergirl fly you in.”
“But you just said….”
Revelation dawns and every beat of her heart rattles the bones of her rib cage. They pound out a beat that she thinks she should have known all along.
Kara could fly her there…. Supergirl can fly you in, Lena….
Maybe she did know.
Maybe she didn’t want to.
“Kara is Supergirl,” Lena says, tongue numb as it rolls over the words.
Jess’ jaw drops as Alex’s face falls blank.
“What are you talking about?” Alex asks, while her ears fill with the sounds of Jess' triumphant I knew it!!
“I touched the brain and now I can read minds,” Lena replies. The words slip past her lips with her mind trailing a few seconds behind. She fights to hold onto the conversation like grains of sand slipping through her hands, but.... “You just said… Thought ….”
It's not a question. The color drains from Alex’s cheeks and Lena doesn’t need alien mind-reading powers to get her confirmation.
“Kara Danvers is Supergirl.”
“Shit. ”