The way Kara leaned against the railing, her head tilted to the sky, had Lena a trifle worried. It had been two weeks since her return from the Phantom Zone, and Kara had been aloof and skittish around nearly everyone.
Why that was so, Lena wasn't entirely sure, but if it helped Kara recover, then she'd do whatever Kara needed.
Which perhaps for now it meant a drink. They all needed it for the current situation. People were randomly -- or not so randomly as Brainy and Lena had started to discover since everything had a pattern in the end -- turning violent. It wasn't a problem that could be punched away, and required precision and swiftness.
Making it difficult for Kara to do much other than move the victims to a holding cell before they hurt more people. Then after a few days, they returned to normal. A baffling illness but one her and Brainy were close to sorting.
Lena poured the scotch and walked up the steps to the balcony. Kara looked back at her, a brief haunted expression on her face, before she smiled.
"Hey." Lena held out a cup. "Looked like you needed it."
Kara grasped it with a soft smile. "Thanks." She swirled the liquid in her glass before taking a small sip.
Lena settled next to her, her shoulder almost touching Kara's, and looked over the city. The one she'd started to think of as home, if home actually existed. Since quitting LuthorCorp and being locked out of everything related to her family, she lived mostly at the Tower. Not that she admitted this to anyone. Once her penthouse sold, she'd have more money to maybe fix her situation.
"Night is one of my favorite times of the day," Kara said, softly. "It's quieter. The soundscape less intense." She pointed toward a nearby skyscraper. "Pigeons nest in the windows of the seventieth floor. Young just settled to sleep, their parents wrapped around them."
Lena studied Kara's profile, the beauty inherent in her tanned skin, sculpted goddess-like face. "I prefer night sometimes too," Lena admitted. "I used to go for walks when you were--" she couldn't bring herself to say it, so instead, she took a shaky breath, "-- to clear my head."
Kara tilted her head to look at her. "How did you find me? Alex refused to say, and Brainy and Nia were all weird about it."
She took a swig of her scotch. "Our first attempt? It was your data crystal. It had your DNA in it. I made a projector calibrated for you. It was within a week of us losing you. But phantoms attacked the city. Alex needed the projector, and I admit, I was ready to throw down with her over it." Lena looked down at her glass, unable to meet Kara's eyes. "If Alex used it? It'd erase your DNA, and the crystal had so little. My attempts to replicate your DNA irritatingly difficult. She had to forcibly take it from me. Said you would have wanted this."
"Wait, you had a way within a week?" Kara looked at her amazed.
Lena frowned. "Kara, did you not hear me? I was going to doom thousands to save one life. Alex said using that projector was the hardest thing she'd ever done. And yet she used it. If I'm faced with the choice to save the world or save you? I'd save you every time. A bit selfish, isn't it?"
"No, it's not." Tears hovered on Kara's lashes. "Lena, remember Crisis? Before the antimatter wave destroyed our home?" Lena looked at her, confused but nodded. "I was talking with Kal. He said the same exact thing. That if faced with saving the universe or saving his wife, he'd choose Lois every time. And honestly, that's okay."
Startled, Lena stared at her. Superman would save Lois before the universe itself? It hit her then. That her love for Kara definitely was not platonic. It wasn't as if she didn't know this at some level, but she'd been burying it so deep. Lost in that web of regret and sorrow, stuck in this netherworld of not quite back to being Kara's best friend but also not her enemy.
She felt like she ought to respond to that, but her brain settled on just "Huh, funny that." Absolutely brilliant response. She took a sip to hide her blush.
Kara smiled and gently tucked a strand of Lena's hair behind her ear. Her fingers lingered over Lena's ear shell and trailed down to her ear lobe. "So what was the second attempt?"
Lena shivered at Kara's touch, her brain not fully recognizing Kara's question until Kara dropped her hand. "Uh, it's ridiculous. I attempted to replicate your DNA to build another projector, but it was too contaminated. So Brainy and Nia went back in time to your junior year of high school. I think about the time of prom? Goal was to get blood from your past self. From what Nia says, things didn't quite go to plan."
Kara laughed. "Oh. Oh, that's why my memories are a bit odd. It's like I have two sets. Or three sets if I count Earth-38. One set involves an alien trying to put me into is menagerie and the other is just going to prom."
"What's the Earth-38 one then?"
"Oh." Kara took a sip and sighed. "Kenny died in that one. He had been showing off his telescope and the pictures he took. Alex and I had to work together for the first time to figure out who killed him because the police were failing. Turned out it was the sheriff who killed him. Alex figured it out first. I had to go save her."
"I'm sorry. Is that why Alex got into crime-fighting?" Lena found she wasn't surprised by the tale. Sounded like Alex.
"You know, probably. On this earth, she solved a different crime. Kenny still died, but it was right after high school. Once again because he took pictures with his telescope and caught a crime on film by accident. Alex solved that one too." Kara drank the rest of the scotch and let out a long sigh. "I broke Kenny's nose trying to kiss him. That was embarrassing."
"Really?" Lena found it amusing and had to stifle a chuckle. "Do you break everyone's noses when you kiss?"
"I have you know that I'm a much better kisser now," Kara said firmly.
"Oh? Like to see you prove it," Lena teased. She was flirting with danger here. If Kara took up the challenge, Lena might not ever recover. Her heart was already putty in Kara's hands, her need to be close to Kara, to do anything for her was already bad enough. Add in kissing?
Yup, Lena's heart might burst from the intensity of her want. Some days kissing Kara dominated nearly all her thoughts, even when she needed to focus. Like now with how close Kara's face was to her own.
Kara smiled and turned to face Lena fully. "Don't tempt me. Wouldn't want to break your nose."
"And there you said you were a better kisser now." Oh, she really couldn't help herself, could she? Her eyes dropped to Kara's lips, and she blushed. Had Kara leaned closer?
Her breath was cool against Lena's skin, her eyes as warm as the stars, and the curve of her lips -- all so gorgeous. Lena's heart definitely had sped up, and her uncooperative mind was chanting, 'kiss me!' over and over.
Not helpful. Lena licked her lips and quickly looked away before she gave in to the temptation. "So, uh, with that DNA from your past self, I remade the projector. Crafted a few extra sun grenades. We headed out soon after."
Kara lifted her hand to comb her fingers through Lena's ponytail. "You seem to be making it a habit of saving me."
Lena shivered when Kara's hand dropped to her neck and trailed through her hairs there. She clenched her glass tighter. "Someone needs to," she quipped, desperate to divert her thoughts from imagining Kara slamming her against a wall to kiss her. Oh, that was perhaps her biggest fantasy. "You got a habit of getting into trouble."
"Got me there." Kara wrapped her arm around Lena and hugged her against her side.
Oh, that was not helping.
But it was so warm. Lena leaned into Kara, her glass left forgotten on the railing, and her other arm curling around Kara's waist.
"Comes with the job," Kara said. For several minutes, she gazed at Lena, her expression one that Lena couldn't quite interpret. "You know," she said, quietly, "While trapped in the Phantom Zone, I... I struggled to not lose myself. Each time I slid to that despair, I thought of you. I know a lot happened between us. Some painful, some good, but despite everything, you've always rooted me. Zehdh-te."
"My home," Lena translated, softly. "Aovehmodh khuph vahdhah rraop." She'd been learning Kryptonese, and now seemed the perfect moment to share that she felt the same. Kara felt like home to her too.
"Lena..." Kara's other hand rose to gently stroke her cheekbone. Her voice shook with an intense emotion Lena couldn't discern. "You... you learned my language?"
She nodded. "Non gaolom khuph osh rraop." ["I am learning it for you."]
Kara's fingers trailed down Lena's face. "But, I don't understand. Why? It's a dead language. No one speaks it here. What -- what use is it for you?"
"For me?" Lena smiled, fondly. "I don't learn it for my sake, Kara. And one person does speak it." She reached up to tap Kara's nose. "You do. And now I can too."
"But Lena, why?" a few tears escaped Kara's wide eyes. "Why speak it with me?"
Tenderly, she brushed away Kara's tears. "Non khehshokh osh rraop." ["Is important to you."]
"Lena..." Kara smiled through her tears. "Pahdh voiehd khuph jevia." ["This makes me happy."}
Kara's thumb brushed over Lena's cheekbone. "I know we have a lot to talk through still, but I'm so, so happy you're back with me."
Tears blurred Lena's vision. "I'm so sorry it took me so long. I let my anger and pain get in the way of seeing your truth. Of understanding."
Kara sniffled, and her hand stilled on Lena's cheek. "I did the same. I got all self-righteous. Thinking I knew what was best. I lied to you, treated you cruelly as Supergirl, felt guilty for it and went to comfort you as Kara. That wasn't right or fair or okay."
"Kara..." Lena struggled against the urge to weep. "That duplicity was why I thought it was all fake. I got trapped into thinking of you like Lex. He toys with me, takes away the good in my life, only to draw me back by offering that hope of family. Of being cared about." She shuddered and pressed her hand against her face. "I fell back on old habits. A revenge game. And I'm so sorry for that. For hurting you. I wish I could go back and stop myself."
She bit back the urge to sob.
Kara's hand dropped to Lena's shoulder. "You were hurt. And you're right. I -- I didn't act much better than your family. I hurt you and got trapped in my web of lies. I thought if I was just Kara with you, that I wouldn't lose you. But I was lying to myself too. I'm so sorry, Lena. You deserve love and care." Her voice wavered, her eyes shining.
Lena thought about some of Kara's favorite musicals and movies. "Isn't there a song from that one musical about witches? Where they sing to each other about how there's blame to share?"
"Yeah. Wicked." Kara laughed, wetly. She took a steadying breath, and began to sing, softly, her voice a gorgeous alto. "And just to clear the air, I ask forgiveness for the things I've done you blame me for. But then, I guess we know there's blame to share, and none of it seems to matter anymore."
As she sang, Lena felt herself fall in love with Kara even more. The way Kara's head tilted up toward the stars, the smile that upturned her lips, the effortless singing, that spanned several octaves, and wove the song around Lena and through her heart.
"Like a comet pulled from orbit as it passes the sun. Like a stream the meets a boulder halfway through the wood. Who can say if I've been changed for the better? I do believe I have been changed for the better, because I knew you, I have been changed for good..." Kara trailed off, her fingers intertwining with Lena's.
"That song," Lena murmured, lost in the blue of Kara's eyes, in the wetness of her lips, her pretty nose, the sharpness of her jaw. She couldn't look away. "Exactly that." The song perfectly summed up how Lena felt now. Even if she did blame herself still, which would always be hard to shake, she had forgiven Kara. Because in the end, none of it mattered anymore.
All that mattered was Kara was alive and back at her side.
Kara nodded. For a long moment, they looked at each other. Then Kara breathed out a rush of cool breath. "I had a chance at a redo." The words spilled out in a rush, as if Kara was almost afraid to say them.
"Redo?" Lena blinked, baffled. That was not what she expected Kara to say.
"This fifth dimensional imp -- not gonna say his name as it'll summon him, and believe me we don't want that -- offered me a chance to change the timeline. He said it was to fix the wrongs he'd done to me. And I chose to try to find a way to repair us."
At that confession, Lena gasped, stunned.
Kara kept going. "We tried four or five different spots in our timeline where I could have told you, and they all went horribly. So then I thought... what if we never met at all? That turned out to be the worst timeline of all." She winced at the memory. "I realized then that you and I were entangled. And honestly? I could spend a lifetime trying to find the right time, but would it fix us? Or was it just me making decisions for you yet again? Isn't that what I'd been doing most of our relationship? So I didn't alter the timeline, because I couldn't do it without your consent. And only a few weeks later you came back to me anyway."
Lena stared and stared, unable to believe her ears. Kara had tried to alter the timeline for her. "Kara," she struggled against tears. "I-- I don't understand. Why me? Why not your planet? Krypton?"
"It never crossed my mind honestly," Kara said, softly. "My home is here now, with you and Alex and our friends. Krypton? Yes, I wish I could bring it back, but at the same time, if I did, I'd never have met you. And in a way, bringing it back wouldn't have solved the problems that caused it's demise in the first place. Sometimes it is better to let go than to hold onto the past." Kara let out a ragged breath.
"Oh." Not the most intelligent of responses, but Lena's brain was caught in the spiral of Kara's confession. To learn she was this important to Kara?
"You know, that offer of a redo helped me understand my cousin," Kara continued, unaware of how she unraveled Lena with each word. "I was willing to risk the timeline and everything just to fix us."
Lena did cry then. That admission mirrored her own. "I don't deserve you, Kara. I've done so much harm--"
"And so much good." Kara pulled her into a tight hug, her lips grazing Lena's temple. "You belong here, Lena. You're part of my family. My favorite person. And I don't want to lose you again. I want to fix this between us."
Lena clung to Kara. "I do too." She buried her face in Kara's shoulder and breathed in her sweet scent. She'd do anything for Kara.
And maybe, once they'd healed a bit more, she'd share her biggest secret of all. The fact she loved Kara more than anything in the universe.
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