Badass’ or Marshmallows’?
There are few well-known truths one can depend on in this world. Taxes, death, pain, heartbreak, and love are just a few. The consequences one faces for messing with the Danvers sister’s is another. They’ve always been fiercely protective of each other, Alex Danvers especially. No one ever got away clean with messing with her sister Kara Danvers. Alex Danvers was more physically protective of Kara. Kara Danvers was just as protective of Alex, she just preferred less physical tactics. Kara would make sure the whole school would shame you for what you did to Alex, very simply using her favorite weapon-words.
Life was, by no means, easy for the Danvers sisters. At the age of 5, Kara lost her parents, her friends, her entire planet. She came to live with the Danvers’ by sheer luck. When they took her in, she became infatuated with Alex, as many younger siblings do. Alex tolerated Kara’s presence in the beginning but soon grew attached to the easily startled, big hearted, wide eyed girl her parents brought into her home without her permission. As soon as that happened separating the two was impossible.
And they got into the craziest shenanigans.
In the middle of the night, about a year after Kara was adopted, the then 6 and 8-year-olds went to work with their parents. While there, they disappeared into an unused lab and started messing with the equipment. This was the day a 6 and 8-year-old accidentally figured out how liquid nitrogen worked. When Eliza and Jeremiah found them, Kara was down to one shoe and Alex had none. They were both lucky they didn’t have any physical damage. But when your sister is an alien who gets powers from the sun, what’s a little liquid nitrogen. The Danvers sisters were never left alone in their parents’ lab again.
In school, there was always that one person that tried to get away with picking on one of the Danvers sisters. It happened every year and every year the bully suffered grave consequences. When Kara was in 6th grade and Alex was in 8th, a new kid decided that Kara was too weird. So, he harassed her to the point of tears. The next week, his main course for lunch consisted of a worm sandwich. No one messed with Alex’s little sister, and she made sure the new kid knew that.
Alex Danvers was no stranger to being an outcast. That’s what happened when word got out that you took whatever measures necessary to protect you sister against bullies. The students tended to steer clear lest they provoke the wrath of 1000 suns wrapped up in a relatively short, yet feisty human female. What she wasn’t exactly used to was being made fun of. She learned this one Monday after a long weekend in 11th grade. She normally kept to herself and didn’t pay much attention to her peers. But it’s hard not to notice when everyone is whispering and pointing at you like you’re an animal on display at the Zoo. She’s standing at her locker when she hears what they’re saying for the first time.
“She’s a lesbian. That’s so gross. She shouldn’t even be allowed to go here,” Alex hears. She wonders for a minute who they’re talking about. Her question is answered when Kara comes up to her and asks if she knew what the school was saying about her. She didn’t care, her biggest concern is how the truth got out. Kara was worried about Alex. The question was answered when Vicki Donahue walked up to her and tried to throw her arm around Alex’s shoulders asking her if she wanted to make out like Alex suggested the other night. Alex moves to punch Vicki but she doesn’t get the chance. Before she can even raise her arm, the bitch is laid out cold on the floor. Kara was standing above her fists still clenched, lucky she’d practiced pulling her hits so much otherwise she might have been charged with manslaughter. After that, everyone in Midvale High School steered clear of both Kara and Alex Danvers.
The trend continued until Alex left for college. The kids in school didn’t exactly mess with Kara but they weren’t nice to her either. When Kara made it to university with Alex, it seemed that all was right in the universe again. The sisters got into things they shouldn’t, only this time, they had training on the equipment in the science labs.
As the first few months of Kara’s freshman year of college passed by, Alex noticed that their group had grown by two. Kara made friends with two guys, Winn Schott and James Olsen, in one of her classes. One night the three of them went out to dinner and ran into Alex. Kara called out to her and motioned for her to join them. So, she did, albeit a little skeptically. As the conversation continued, however, she could see why Kara liked them so much. They all had something in common. They were misfits. Winn was awkward and unsure of himself in social settings. James was more confident but he seemed reserved and quiet until he got to know the people around him.
By December of that year, the circle of people Alex would give her life to protect grew from one person to three. This was proven the night that she found Winn on the verge of a panic attack. He and James had gone to a party, Kara and Alex were going to head over once Alex finished her last final, celebrating the universities latest win in basketball and the end of finals. While there, Winn ran into a guy, Jason, he’d been talking to from class. They disappeared, like two people who are infatuated with each other do, to fool around in a random room. The person whose room it was walked in in the midst of clothes being thrown and started to leave apologizing for interrupting. At least he was until he saw that it was two guys instead of a guy and a girl. He rushed forward grabbed Winn by his shoulders and threw him backward to the ground. He landed on his wrist and heard a crack. Winn was unaware that Jason he was on the football team, he didn’t follow sports. He was also unaware that this was one of his teammate's rooms.
The guy, whom Winn learned later was named Maxwell Lord, that threw him to the ground started beating up Jason. Partygoers rushed to see what the commotion was. James forced his way to the front of the crowd and saw Winn on the ground. James moved to try and pry Lord off of Jason but a couple of behemoth football players stopped him. The more he struggled, the harder they held him back eventually turning to hit James until he went limp in their arms.
Alex and Kara walked into the house arm in arm, smiles on their faces. The smiles retreated, however, when they were faced with a group of people blocking the stairs. Alex stopped someone walking toward them asking what was happening. The response worried her, “There’s a fight upstairs a couple of guys were shagging up together.” Kara was one step ahead of Alex, using her super strength to clear a path up the steps. Kara and Alex stepped in the room and froze. James was laid out on the floor and Winn was clutching his wrist gasping for breath. Lord was still throwing hit after hit into Jason. Alex ran up, Spun Lord around, ducked under his fist and landed a hard kick to his groin. Lord fell to the ground groaning in pain. His two goons dropped Jason in a heap on the floor, running toward Alex. Alex dropped to the floor swinging her leg out spinning of a circle, tripping both of them. One started to get up and she kneed him in the face. The other moved to a standing position behind Alex’s back. He didn’t have a chance to do anything because Kara had him in a headlock before he took a step.
Alex helped Winn stand, gently draping his button up and coat around his shoulders. Kara picked James up and carried him out of the house to the car. They took the boys to the hospital to make sure they were ok. The next day all four of them made their way to Midvale to spend the holidays with their newly fortified family.
When they returned to campus following holiday break, the video of the Danvers sisters kicking ass had made the rounds through campus. The point had been made. Don’t mess with the Danvers sisters and don’t mess with anyone in their circle, or you will regret it.
When scheduling their classes for the spring semester, the four friends worked it out so they could all eat lunch together four days a week. During one of these lunches, three women approached their table. The laughing group stopped immediately and stared at the intruders.
Alex recognized one of the women from several of her upper division science classes. “Hey, You’re in my molecular physiology class with Dr. Pierce right.” She asked the tallest of the three.
“Yeah, that class is really interesting but could potentially make me pull every hair out of my head at the same time. I’m Lena Luther by the way.”
“Alex Danvers and I know what you mean but Pierce does an excellent job explaining the information.”
“Yes, he does.” The woman in the middle, shorter than Lena but just taller than the woman on the left, clears her throat. “Oh, right. Um, this is Maggie Sawyer,” she points to the woman who cleared her throat, “and this is Lucy Lane.”
“We saw the video of you too beating up Lord and is asshole goons and we just wanted to say thank you,” Maggie spoke up.
“Yeah, he’s one of the biggest pains in our asses. He talks to us derogatorily every time he sees us just because he disagrees with our lifestyle choices.” Lucy continues for Maggie dropping her voice to mimic (mock) a male jock voice.
“Your lifestyle choices?” Kara inquires.
“Yeah, Maggie here is like the biggest lesbian ever to lesbian, Luther is Bi, and I very happily and proudly identify as pan sexual.” Lucy finishes eyeing James.
“Cool it, Lane,” Maggie warns. “Anyway, we all met last year in the LGBTQ+ club on campus and we wanted to reach out to Winn,” she turns away from staring at Alex and looks at who she assumes is Winn asking with her eyes if she’s right. He nods his head and she continues. “We wanted to make sure he was ok and that he knew about the resources available to those in the community on campus.” Maggie finishes.
“We are open to all who would like to join though, allies included. Just so you all know.” Lucy adds still not removing her eyes from James.
“That won’t be a problem.”
“Oh yeah, why’s that Danvers?”
Alex scans the table making sure it’s ok that she speaks for everyone. Getting affirmative nods from her family she answers, “Winn and I are both gay, Kara here is pan as well, and James is Bi.” When she’s done talking she meets Maggie’s eyes smiling shyly.
“Well in that case all of you should come to our meeting tonight at 7 in the basement of the Union. We have stale donuts and water. Some of us go out after too, but you have to be of age to drink.” She invites momentarily dropping her smirk to meet the eyes of Winn, Kara, and James.
“We’ll think about it.”
“Alright, we’ll get out of your hair but we hope to see you tonight.”
The four nod and say bye as Maggie, Lena, and Lucy walk away. They end up going to the meeting that night and every week after that. By the time finals roll around this time Alex and Kara’s circle of close friends grows by three. The number of people they would give up everything for grows by three. Maggie and Alex are dating. Kara and Lena are dating. James and Lucy are dating. And Winn, well Winn met a very nice guy in the club named Clark, who just happened to be Kara’s long-lost cousin she thought had died when Krypton exploded.
To the outside world, Kara and Alex Danvers were two very badass women-badass sisters- but their friends know the truth. Yes, they can be badass’ when they need to be but, in reality, they are just incredibly protective of those they care about. When they let people in, those people see that they are truly teddy bears. Those people are also the luckiest people in the entire world.
