Ever since that night when Reign defeated Supergirl, she has changed—Lena thinks it might be because Supergirl is a friend of hers and she’s anxious, too, because no one knows what happened to the heroine.
Lena notices how different this…Kara is. She’s restrained, stiff but not in the adorable, awkward way her Kara is. Her voice is the same, when she tells Lena good morning and asks how her day has been like the past few days hadn’t happened. When Lena hesitates to answer, this Kara asks what’s wrong, and the crinkle between her eyebrows is the same but something is off. This Kara’s smile doesn’t quite reach her eyes…
And her eyes, they’re different. They look the same, but they feel… Different. Like she’s seeing Lena in a different way, and Lena wonders if she’s finally lost belief in her and sees her now as a Luthor.
She tells herself she’s imagining things, and laughs when Kara tells a donut pun. Tells herself this is her Kara, and that everything is fine and she’s overthinking.
This Kara nods, smiles, and pulls Lena into a hug. They do it now, more often than they used to, and it’s then that something clicks—their hug isn’t quite as warm as before, and there’s something off with the way this Kara held her. This Kara’s hug doesn’t quite make her feel as warm as their ones before, like she’s hugging a whole another person who looks and smells and feels like Kara but-
But isn’t Kara, and there’s something wrong. Something is awfully wrong.
“I don’t know who or what you are,” Lena whispers against this Kara’s ear. She doesn’t have a weapon to threaten her—it—with, but she angles her arm around her neck just slightly, and one wrong move and Lena could end it. The blonde stiffens a bit, and Lena feels panic and anger flare in her at the thought of this- whatever this is, pretending to be her Kara. “You tell me now where my Kara is, or I will hurt you.”
The blonde doesn’t move. Lena thinks it doesn’t breathe, but then feels her sigh with something like defeat. “I can’t tell you,” she says.
“You can and you will,” Lena demands, puts pressure around the blonde’s neck. She doesn’t fight back. “Tell me where my Kara is!”
The blonde stays still for a long time. Lena grows impatient, anger flaring and making her fingers twitch, but before she could move, the blonde speaks.
“She’s safe,” she murmurs. “Recovering.”
Everything clicks into place and Lena’s heart drops.
Lena harasses fake Kara. Repeatedly. Demands her where her Kara is, who the fuck she is, how her Kara is doing. She had seen the way Supergirl had fallen, lifeless, and the mere thought of her Kara broken like that makes Lena tear up, makes her scream in fake Kara’s face to demand where her Kara is.
She doesn’t say anything, says it’s confidential.
Lena turns to Alex. James Olsen. Stalks that Winn Schott, Jr. in case he knew something. They tell her Kara’s fine, tells her of fake Kara’s location, and asks her if she’s okay.
She’s not okay. Her Kara is broken—recovering, but badly hurt—somewhere and she wants, needs to know where she is. Needs to see her.
She needs to know she’s alive. Just that would suffice.
No one tells her anything, but she’s Lena Luthor and she will tear the planet apart before she gives up on her Kara.
She finds the DEO, after eighteen hours of nonstop research, hacking, counterhacking. There are bags under her eyes and fear in her heart but she finds the DEO, walks into the building they use as a front and demands to see Supergirl. She has a gun on her waist and anger in her gaze and someone is given clearance to let her in and she takes it, storms through everything until she’s lead to a room where her Kara is—broken and bruised but alive.
Lena cries. She doesn’t leave her side for hours, hours, days, weeks, and Lena sits on the floor, bags under her eyes and fading hope in her heart as she watches her Kara fight for life.
Lena cries.
Lena cries. She doesn’t leave her Kara’s side, and she’s the first to see her fingers twitch, voluntarily, the first to see blue eyes flicker back to life—and it’s her, her Kara, broken and bruised and alive and it’s her and things aren’t quite right yet but it’s her Kara.
“You’re here,” her Kara croaks, broken but alive.
“You’re back,” Lena cries. Kara smiles, broken but somehow full of life.
Question of Smoke 