randomthingsthatilike123:

It’s funny that I keep seeing things that act as if Lena
would be the helpless one out of her and Kara and I absolutely adore Kara and
the girl is a damn genius with super powers and picks up things fast, but growing up she also had to
deal with extreme culture shock, PTSD, and along with powers sensory overload,
to name just a few of the things about
her childhood on Earth. She comes from a dying planet with insanely advanced
technology and science—not really survival skills, and more so just trying to
adapt and heal.

Lillian was teaching Lena chess at the age of 4. And say
what you want about the Luthors, and there’s plenty, we see Lena working
weekends, nights, hell Thanksgiving—she’s a CEO by 24, probably more than a few
degrees. That kind of work ethic and drive (regardless if it’s actually
healthy, it’s huge) didn’t come from
nowhere. Every single skill Lionel and Lillian could cram into Lex and Lena,
they probably did. Regardless of how Lillian might feel about Lena she’s going
to have expectations, and at the absolute least if she’s going to have to be
this girl’s mother she might as well make her useful, or someone for Lex to
compete against, and Lillian loves Lex.

There’s no point to giving him a rival if that person isn’t pushed
and given the same kind of preparation and training and education that he
receives. And Lillian is someone who can be on the run from everyone and not get caught—that’s going
to take more than just money, that’ll take skill. Not to mention running a
black ops program with no one the wiser isn’t exactly on the list of things
that a rich housewife can do.

Kara is from a technologically advanced planet—maybe a few
days is fine but she’s probably so horrified
not to be around any tech she only likes camping for the difference in her
senses and all the pretty nature and landscape. Imagine if you went back to a
time before indoor plumbing—and sure a week of it is fine but months and months???? No. It’s probably worse
for Kara. She was p well supplied with tech, if the spy beacon that Astra had
that had a signal that could be received anywhere
was simply a child’s plaything—or if it wasn’t, and it was something she had
because of Astra’s military connections, then who knows what else she had
access to? She’s probably good with mechanics, to a certain extent because of
her father the scientist—who created a damn rocket
and taught her plenty about mechanical engineering—but they would have had
different elements on Krypton. It’s hard to know how to build something
when all the materials are different—Lena
would be just as screwed if she was given Kryptonian materials from the get go.

But my point is, Lena is probably actual fucking MacGyver,
or even better yet, the Supergirl version of Elliot Spencer. The Luthors definitely
seem like the kind of people who have their kids be in Boy/Girl Scouts, because
you never know when you might need those skills—they’re Luthors, they have people
gunning for them from the cradle. You never know when you might need some of
those skills, especially if you need to go off grid, or have to dump everything
in a moment’s notice. Like I’m not making a definitive statement, except yes,
yes I am if you gave Lena a knife and some decently warm clothes and set her
off into a forest she’d probably be fine for however long she’d be there for.
Lillian and probably Lionel seem like they would definitely hire a swim coach
to make sure their strokes are textbook perfect, but first they’d absolutely and quite literally throw them in the deep end to teach them
how to swim—the coach is about achieving perfection, and this is survival. And
Luthors don’t depend on anyone else for that—the sooner they learn that the better.

A powerless Kara, on
the other hand, would be absolutely fucked. She may have gone camping w
alex but lbr kara definitely used heat vision to start a fire and has no idea
what kind of clothes to pack or what to do about bug bites and maybe knows how
to pitch a tent and some useful things that don’t rely on her powers but 5 minutes
after losing her powers she cuts her hand on glass and breaks her arm—it’s not
a matter of intellect, but it’s kind of like how astronauts look up when they
drop a pencil—you get used to a certain baseline. Kara could definitely learn,
but Lena already knows what she’s doing. Lena was taught she couldn’t trust on
anyone but herself to survive and Kara was taught stronger together. This isn’t to say this is a failure of Kara’s
that this isn’t her mentality—Kara has plenty of knowledge about science and
alien cultures and technology and language and religion and understanding of
people that Lena probably struggles with, especially in comparison. Kara was
doing calculus at least since she was 4. Honestly out of the two of them she’s
most likely better at science and
math—but it’s probably painful for her bc it reminds her of Krypton, and it’s
not like humans are going to be very accepting of a 15 year old trying to
correct them on widely accepted theories. That would bring attention.

Kara was told to hide—Lena was told she wasn’t allowed to,
that she had to be extraordinary because
that’s what Luthors are.

We see in her very first episode she’s a marksman, able to shoot
the man that had Alex hostage without even hesitation. We also see her Gerry
rig that device at her charity under the table with a tiny bit of help from Winn, but not that much—that’s not exactly a
lab setting.

The Luthors have so many back up plans and hidey holes that
their family motto almost seems to be “be prepared.” Like Lena does not like
Roulette and has 0 plans on ever going to her fight club but she knew exactly where
the address was from the top of her head, without consulting a planner. And
the fight clubs most likely rotate
where they’re at—sure Roulette has connections but the DEO took Leslie Willis—if
they don’t know about her she’s not going to bring her to their attention. And
still Lena knew where it was, because it’s
important to be prepared.

Or better yet—the Luthor motto might be all knowledge is worth having.

Lena probably picks up new skills in her “free time”—or really
whatever time she has that she’s not working at her company, not able to simply
lay around and do nothing. “You never know when you might need to know how to wrangle
a crocodile kara” “You never know when an assassin might try to kill me while I’m
on ice Kara” “You never know when you might need to know this very obscure and
esoteric language Kara” “It’s a very distinctive sound and one day I might need
to be able to distinguish between the sounds different guns make when cocked
Kara” “Who knows if you’re ever in the mountains with only a paper clip and a
hair tie Kara” “Kara it’s always useful to know how to be able to get out of a
straight jacket without any help”

Kara is very confused about her strange nerdy friend but
Lena feels such vINDICATION the first time something she’s been practicing
requires her expertise you said it was
weird to know how to competitively duck herd AND YET HERE WE ARE WITH A DEADLY ALIEN
SPECIES THAT RESEMBLES IN SEVERAL WAYS DUCKS

tl;dr Lena would be absolutely fine wherever she’s dropped
up to and including the woods or a farm with only the clothes on her back and a
used tissue and after a week or so Kara would be clutching her phone wondering
where the wifi is