#supergirl redo

[lena-in-a-red-dress]

What are six Supercorp arcs from the series you wish the show would’ve expanded on or just done in a different way? And how would you have written them?

Hm. 6 is a lot of arcs. But I'll give it a stab...

1) Cadmus. Ive always felt that they were built up more than they followed up with. I would have loved for them to be a big bad, rather than a b-plot bad. With Lena playing a big part in taking them down.

2) Lex. How the show handled Lex was such bullshit. Even before Supergirl became the Lex Luthor show, the writers' biggest mistake was making him a villain for Kara rather than allowing him to remain Lena's villain. Because that's what he always should have been.

3) Rift. I think I've talked this one about half to death, so I probably don't have to go into anymore detail, but yeah. They went kind of screwy with Lena's reaction and her Non Nocere angle, where I think it would have been more impactful if they had kept the fallout more emotional and internal to Kara and Lena as characters. Like, it should have been the undercurrent of the season, not the catalyst for someone going evil.

4) Crisis. This one is easy-- keep Lex dead and not merge/rewrite the realities. The continuity was absolutely ruined by Crisis and I'll never forgive them.

5) Children of Liberty. I feel like this one was disappointing because they took a very real and valid issue and turned it sideways to mimic current events. The writers tried to loop Guardian into the plot there, and ultimately failed to make the angle engaging whatsoever.

6) Red Daughter. There was no fallout for this one. Kara absorbed Red Daughter and absolutely nothing came of it. She didn't change, in either personality or abilities. So what was the point? Idk. I think they could have utilized Red Daughter in a more meaningful way while she was alive too. I would have liked her to have room to grow as a person, rather than being treated as a prop to support Lex's plans of world domination. Maybe let her interact with Lena more. Maybe let her have doubts in Lex and start breaking away from him even before she learns the whole truth about him. Let more of Kara's personality/identity emerge to shift her allegiance to the side of good, and let her disagree with Lex's methods, if not his purpose.

----

This being said however, I don't think there's been a single arc since S2 that I've 100% been okay with, that I don't think I couldn't have done better. That might be a little egocentric of me, but it's the truth. I'm really good at seeing an idea and immediately expanding on it to suit my likes and dislikes to create content I wanna see-- canon be damned.

[crimescrimson]

Ada Wong and Sherry Birkin: Giving their love interest the Look.

[dc-sideblog]

Read this post by @argoscity and decided to draw it

Read that gold is so common on Krypton that it’s worthless and instead they value boradium. I’ve decided boradium is silver-purple

[id: Kara Zor-El floating in the sky wearing a redesigned suit. The suit has a half cape in green with a slit in the side so that it can be partially belted into her outfit. The cape is tied around her shoulders with a chain. Kara is wearing matching blue gloves and boots with boradium trim. Her suit is mainly white otherwise and the House of El crest is also made of boradium. Kara is wearing a green headband. Her eyes are an inhuman shade of blue.]

Flat color version

[id: the same image as earlier but without any shading]

[misandriste]

[endless gifs of lena luthor] [no. 17 redo]

Katie McGrath as Lena Luthor SUPERGIRL ⪼ 3.01, "Girl of Steel"

[argoscity]

Ana Nogueira, the actress and playwright who is now making forays into screenwriting, has been tapped to pen Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, a standalone feature centered on the Kryptonian cousin of Superman being developed by DC Studios. No director is attached and Nogueira’s deal only recently closed. The project is actually a redo for Nogueira. The writer was quietly hired to pen a Supergirl movie in 2022 when Warner Bros. was developing the project as a spinoff of The Flash, then in post-production. Flash featured Sasha Calle as the heroine and the hope was to launch another DC film franchise. Gunn and Safran liked the work Nogueira had done on the previous Supergirl project and quietly brought her back, even giving her an overall DC writing deal. Nogueira may be best known for a stint on CW’s The Vampire Diaries, with acting credits including The Michael J. Fox Show and the recent Starz series Hightown. But she has also built a thriving writing career. Her play Which Way to the Stage debuted off-Broadway in 2022 and she is working on an adaptation of author Alice Sola Kim’s short story Mothers, Lock Up Your Daughters, set up at Warners with 21 Laps producing.

[zahri-melitor]

Flipping through the Prez trade I'm reminded that it is truly one of the weirdest properties DC has, given how much is going on in so few issues.

It had a 4 issue run in 1973 before cancellation, and had already run out of ideas hard enough to randomly pop vampires into issue 4.

There's a single crossover to Supergirl.

The next Prez story ended up in Cancelled Comic Cavalcade #2 1978, aka 'we are doing the absolute minimum possible to protect our IP and copyright, nobody will ever see this'. If you don't know the history of how Cancelled Comic Cavalcade happened, read up on it. It's wild and probably best described as a professional's zine (and despite redoing the colouring for the 1973 run, the trade doesn't even ATTEMPT to colour this)

Nobody touches the property again for 20 years, until Neil Gaiman resurrects it in the Sandman #54 to deconstruct the concept of a story of a teen president.

This goes over so well that Ed Brubaker picks up the concept and desconstructs it even further to interrogate the mythology of a forgotten and hidden man who was a teen president in Vertigo Visions: Prez #1 (and seriously for anyone who's read the Sandman issue and hasn't read Brubaker's story, track it down. It's absolutely worthy)

Frank Miller (yes really) then decides he can make the mythology even weirder in The Dark Knight Strikes Again and hypotheses an aged Prez Rickard who's actually a hologram who once again becomes president.

Grant Morrison has never heard of a terrible Silver Age concept that they didn't half recall and want to put into a title, so proceeds to declare Prez to belong to Earth-47 in the Multiverse. Nothing outside of a Christmas story in the 2021 anthology has ever come out of this.

Frantically trying to find more ideas to keep 52 different comics running during New 52, DC decides to reboot the Prez franchise in the lead up to the 2016 US Federal Election by inventing Beth Ross as a new generation's Teen President and hiring Mark Russell to write a maxi in full satire mode. It gets cancelled after 6 issues.

[superxkorra]

10.5k words later, after an long writing break (long for me), I finally finished editing and publishing the fifth installment to my Your Love Was Home (Supercorp) series.

Of course, I had to mess up the coding for the emphasis, so part of the story is missing italicization where it needed it (flashback sequence towards the end). I'm too tired, sick, and frustrated to redo it all now. So, just imagine it's there and bare with me.

Enjoy.

[singinprincess]

i know you didn't ask for this but please rank the barbie movies you've seen 😇

Okay this is HARD… I'm going off memory and writing them in order from best to worst but the only like… certain ones for me is the first and last on this list. I hated the last one, couldn't finish it lol.

Barbie as the Princess and the Pauper (ultimate barbie movie)

Barbie and the Magic of Pegasus

Barbie as Rapunzel (she was an ARTISTE)

Barbie Fairytopia

Barbie and the Secret Door

Barbie of Swan Lake (still the prettiest Barbie ever imo I need the doll)

Barbie as the Island Princess (this was basically barbie as tarzan btw)

Barbie the Pearl Princess

Barbie and the Diamond Castle (gay)

Barbie Star Light Adventure (she was a badass - they need to do more scifi stuff and stop redoing the mermaid/fairy thing)

Barbie the Princess and the Popstar (they wanted to recreate the magic of the first on this list and it came pretty close… but the music wasn't as good)

Barbie Princess Charm School (felt like Sabrina or something!)

Barbie in a Mermaid Tale

Barbie in the Nutcracker

Barbie: Spy Squad (this was basically Totally Spies Barbie edition)

Barbie liveaction (only this low because I deserved an in love Barbie/Ken and they failed me)

Barbie in Princess Power (Supergirl barbie edition could've been better but I still liked it a lot)

Barbie Mermaidia

Barbie and the 12 Dancing Princesses

Barbie in a Mermaid Tale 2

Barbie Fairytopia Magic of the Rainbow

Barbie in the Pink Shoes (mainly this low because they didn't reuse the dress from Swan Lake!!)

Barbie and the Three Musketeers

The Barbie Diaries

Barbie Video Game Hero

Barbie Thumbelina (was this even Barbie??? they were so ugly)

… after I did this I'm wondering if this is even what you meant… whatever I love Barbie 🩷

[romancomicsnews]

Movie Redo: My take on Batman's Insurgency from The Snyder Cut

While I was not crying out for more Snyder content, I was surprisingly impressed with Zack Snyder's Justice League. Yes, it is a long, and a little heavy on slow motion, but it had a vision that in my opinion, make his first two movies better. I don't think I connect with it in the same ways other do, but clearly it invokes passion.

While Zack Snyder's Justice League brought closure to a lot of DC fans, it brought a want for more from a lot of others, particularly in its closing scenes involving the Knightmare.

This battle between Batman, heroes, and an evil Superman has been teased throughout Batman vs Superman and The Snyder Cut. While I don't think this will ever truly happen, I want to focus on one aspect of the film that boggled my mind, the team that Batman assembles.

Batman assembles of team of heroes and villains to fight Superman, which in theory is a lot of fun and should be a team worth rooting for. However it is made up of (mostly in hindsight) some problematic stars and questionable choices in characters, none whom I believe could actually defeat Superman.

I want to go through the DCEU and make a team of heroes and villains that I think 1) would join up with Batman 2) would be able to put up a fight against Superman and 3) would make for an interesting movie.

Stipulations for myself are no heroes introduced after The Snyder Cut, as Zack would not have had access to them. So sorry, no Blue Beetle, no Supergirl, no Black Adam. But any heroes and villains introduced before then are fair game.

I also want to generally keep the same types of characters that are on the team. Let's say two villains, two younger heroes, and two Leaguers.

First, let's look at who is staying:

Keepers

Besides Batman, I only have the one.

I think having a Justice League member who remembers what Superman was like and to have Batman's back is a great idea. While I do love the Barry and Bruce relationship in comics and other media, Ezra Miller is not a person I can stand behind nor do I want to see in more movies for a long while.

Ray Fisher was done dirty by Warner Bros and Joss Whedon. He is a fantastic actor and plays my favorite character in Zack Snyder's Justice League. Bringing him along as both muscle and tech support makes sense. And given his technology being of alien origin, he may have a chance of actually putting up a fight against Superman.

In this film, I want Cyborg to represent the hope for Humanity. He has been taken over by something terrible, like alien technology, and has overcome it. Despite everything that has happened, Cyborg still believes they can save the world, and Superman. I think it would be a nice change of pace for the character and keep him at the heart of the film.

Now let's go on to the fun ones.

The Villains

The DCEU has a surprising amount of villains to choose from when it comes to people who would join the team. While both Joker and Deathstroke are fun fan favorite characters, I think for this cast, we can do better.

While I love the idea of Joe Manganiello as Deathstroke, he doesn't seem suited for a fight with the Man of Steel.

Similarly, Jared Leto's Joker seems like a pointless nuisance at best. Having a crash wild card on the team seems fun, but wrong direction.

Let's start with the obvious pick.

Lex Luthor

If we are doing a world where Superman truly goes evil, why not get help from the man who has been saying he would the Whole Time?!

I'm not a huge fan of Jesse Eisenbergs Lex Luthor, but in the post credits scene, he had seemed to calm down quite a bit, and seemed closer to the Luthor we know and love.

I still don't know if he entirely would nail it, but having Luthor on the team adds that same level of uneasiness Joker does while adding competence.

Luthor could have a chip on his shoulder with a lot of "I told you all" energy I love. And with his strong knowledge on Superman, and maybe a mech suit, he'd be incredibly useful against Superman.

I think we missed an opportunity to further Luthor's involvement in this universe in a fun and interesting way, and he should absolutely be a part of this team.

Ocean Master

While I did love the inclusion of Mera, I did not love the inclusion of Amber Heard. Having a violent Atlantean out for blood and vengeance for Arthur's death is a fun concept. Which brought me to his brother, Orm.

My hope is in Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, Orm comes to an understanding and love for his brother. If that were true, Superman killing his brother (and likely the world's oceans) would put him on a warpath with Orm.

I think Orm is one of those characters elevated by the actor playing him, Patrick Wilson. And given Wilson and Snyder have worked together, I think the collaboration is in order.

I think Orm is a good middle ground between Mera and Deathstroke, filling out both roles all while bringing an angry, violent energy to the team.

Heroes

While there are quite a few heroes in the DCEU, I tried to pick heroes Batman has not interacted with, or that would join his cause. Let's start with the bigger ask:

Harley Quinn

If we want to match that chaotic Joker energy, Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn is the better way to go about it. This would be reminiscent of the Injustice Games where she goes good, following Batman's lead as his second in command.

She can represent how far both she and Bruce have come, having put aside their differences, even forgiving her for the death of Robin. While I know she's not the truest hero, we only see her as a protagonist throughout her films, and I'd like to keep her that way.

While I don't think she's the most useful in a fight against Superman, I think she still adds much needed humor to the bruting team. Plus, we can give her a Kryptonite hammer and boom, she's in the fight.

I also want a character who can annoy Lex with her presence. I think those two would be at each other's throats the entire time.

And Finally:

Shazam!

If there is one thing Batman is known to do, it's recruit a kid. While we can't have the Black Adam/Superman match up the Rock so desperately wants, we can have a more competent Billy Batson on the team.

As a hero with similar powers and magic at his disposal, Shazam would be the most capable in a fight against Superman. In this version, he has lost his Shazamily, and now hones the power of all of the Council of Wizards, making him the ideal foe for Superman.

Batman not having an absolute tank on his team in the fight against Superman is insane. Shazam serves as Bruces back up plan incase they run into Superman. While he doesn't truly believe Billy can beat him, he thinks Shazam could sacrifice himself and save the others in time to come up with a true plan.

Levi can add comedy but mix in drama and sadness of his lost family. Levi's acting is often underutilized in the Shazam films, and under Snyder we may get some absolute gold.

Having a powerful Wizard, an Atlantean King, a Genius, a Motherbox enhanced Cyborg and one of the best members of the Suicide Squad on a team together led by Batman gives us not only a colorful cast of characters, but the DCEU a fighting chance against Superman.

Thank you for reading! If you'd like to support me you can:

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[wilygryphon]

Profile Masterpost

Hi. WilyGryphon here. How is everyone doing?

What you can expect from me: I write fanfiction and I draw, and I will reflect and provide commentary/reblog commentary and gags that I particularly like on fandoms that I am involved in.

I also stream video games on Twitch. Come check me out: https://www.twitch.tv/wilygryphon

My YouTube Link: https://www.youtube.com/@WilyGryphon (most of my media right now is stream VODs)

My ask box is open, and I would love to hear from you!

My Works:

Kingdom Hearts - Destiny Vault

My first fanfic. Ongoing. Tells an all new, all different adventure that diverges from canon after KHII. Upon learning that Maleficent and a new foe have gathered an assortment of villains to seek a great power that would change the balance of power—and will cause untold destruction in order to get it—the heroes unite and go on a quest to thwart them. Along the way, they learn of and work to solve the problems faced by friends old and new.

Fic: FFN AO3 Tags: X

Heart of Steel

Fusion Fic Crossover Saga between Kingdom Hearts and the Arrowverse (will ultimately expand into greater Disney and DC Comics lore). Sora and Kara Zor-El are adopted siblings, and they journey together with Donald and Goofy to save the worlds from the forces of Darkness.

Fic: FFN AO3 Tags: X

Non-Penned AUs

All Miraculous Ladybug AUs linked on the sub-masterpost Here

Miraculous Ladybug Rewrite

How I would redo the story of Miraculous Ladybug if I were to do so. Notable details would be: Chloé gets a redemption that sticks; Gabriel is more consistent in terms of his standards and what he is willing to do for his goal; Season 3 finale identity reveal; and Adrigaminette endgame. Here

Gryphonverse

A massive multimedia multi-fandom Crossover which I am currently outlining. Includes several different works that take place in the same world (and some that are in different worlds but tie in with the others; they all share the same continuity). Here

The Key to the Miraculous (KH + ML Crossover)

Sora winds up in the Miraculous Ladybug universe after the events of KH3, and he ends up befriending the cast and joining forces with Ladybug and Chat Noir. Here

Ragnarok de Dies Irae

Post-KH3 Epic where recent crises have destabilized barriers in space-time, resulting in sealed gods returning to threaten the worlds. The Guardians of Light work to stop these entities and restore order to the worlds. Meanwhile, Sora works to protect the stability from a different plane of existence while searching for a way back home. Here

My Fandoms:

TV Series:

Arrowverse (Arrow, Flash, Supergirl, DC's Legends of Tomorrow, Black Lightning, Batwoman) Stargirl Superman & Lois The Owl House Amphibia Gravity Falls Miraculous Ladybug Warrior Nun Avatar: The Last Airbender Once Upon a Time Tangled: The Series Young Justice Spongebob Squarepants Danny Phantom Fairly OddParents Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius Scooby-Doo The Mandalorian Teen Titans Wednesday DC Animated Universe Ben 10 Veronica Mars iZombie Generator Rex Galavant Kim Possible Phineas and Ferb Sleepy Hollow (2013) The Secret Saturdays The Suite Life of Zack and Cody

Movies:

Marvel Cinematic Universe DC Extended Universe Star Wars Disney Shrek How to Train Your Dragon Indiana Jones Nimona

Video Games:

Kingdom Hearts Final Fantasy The Legend of Zelda Professor Layton Ace Attorney The World Ends With You Sly Cooper Nicktoons Unite Super Mario Bros Super Smash Bros

Books:

Harry Potter Percy Jackson, Heroes of Olympus, Trials of Apollo The Kane Chronicles Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel The Bartimaeus Sequence The Savior's Series The Powers (Haven's Secret) The Sisters Grimm Septimus Heap Land of Oz The Maze Runner

[lena-in-a-red-dress]

Okay so that lex breaks Supergirl au was totally savage but I liked it. Sort of reminds me of injustice where superman is also tricked into accidentally killing the love of his life. I don’t know if in the context of this story kara would snap in the same way. I can see her perhaps going after lex and perhaps causing some damage to anything that gets in her way. But what if she goes back in time only to discover that Lena’s death is at a fixed point in the timeline? That no matter what, she will die and it’ll always somehow be lex’s doing.

I also got Injustice vibes, though that wasn't my initial intent. I don't think Kara would get involved in world affairs, but she would definitely kill Lex for good before retiring to Argo. Or asking to take Mxy up on his supercorp redo offer. Like, she didn't take him up on it before, but now she needs it, and he likes her, so.... there's options??

As for the fixed point business, I think if she does try to change time, it would work. I dunno if I could put her through all that again only to find out there's no way Lena survives. That wasn't really the point of this idea.

[crimescrimson]

Resident Evil in the Eyes Of The Beholder: @mekakoi Edition

[finallyafemalesuperhero]

Honestly pretty cringe of us to just argue in a podcast

but we aren't going to redo the episode so

[ewokcrowe]

If the rebooting of the DCEU were in my hands, I'd keep Jason Mamoa as Aquaman, Henry Cavill as Superman, Zachary Levi as Shazam, the current JSA members as. . . well. . . the JSA members, Dwayne Johnson as Black Adam, & Ben Afleck as Batman (although replacing him with a younger Batman might be a good idea). I'd redo the Green Lantern movie but with a few changes, like replacing Hal Jordan with John Stewart or just adding him as Earth's other GL. Plus, I'd keep General Swanwick AKA Martian Manhunter & the current Cyborg. In addition, I'd introduce Blue Beetle, Firestorm, Captain Atom, Supergirl, all the Teen Titans, Mon-El, Black Lightning, & Icon (since some people apparently want a black Superman). I'd definitely still replace Ezra Miller as Flash though (& probably Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman too).

[thesupergirls]

Rao’s Descendant

[searidings]

....🥺 can you please tell us more about that season 5 alternate ending where andrea ends up using the dagger pretty please, just like who does she end up hurting and the others reaction? if only you want to of course !

hooookay this ask got me to open that wip for the first time in a year and actually it's not that far from being complete! but idk how to finish it and i feel like i've done the s5 conflict resolution thing in multiple fics now like how many is too many? i fear i may have hit that limit. BUT since you asked, here is the beginning of it. please note:

1) this thing is angsty and also it's unfinished, so read at your own peril

2) because i wasn't ever expecting to finish/publish it, i've recycled bits of description from it into other fics. so if you see stuff i've repeated elsewhere no you don't <3

-

The last thing Lena sees is a flash like dark shadow pass over Andrea’s eyes, before a kryptonite dagger slides between her ribs.

The sound she emits is less of a scream and more of a surprised squeak as she sinks to the ground.

If you want to get to Supergirl, you’re gonna have to go through me.

It’s not that she hadn’t believed Andrea would do it. Lena was under no illusion of safety when she placed herself between Supergirl and the glowing green rock in Andrea’s hand. She’d come to terms with the possibility of dying for Kara long ago.

What she hadn’t been able to prepare for was the pain. The abstract of sacrifice was all well and good, but. Reality, this searing epicentre, a point of white hot agony turned molten, seeping through her body. No amount of her mother’s decorum training had prepared her for this.

Something is filling her mouth, thick and dark and oozing. She can’t scream. Kara sits, eyes silver, a world away. Kara. Lena has to move. She can’t. Andrea steps over her, and is that the pounding of receding footsteps or the dogged beat of Lena’s heart? Either way, it’s slowing. Every inhale cracks her body down the centre, each exhale buries shards of glass inside the gaping wound.

Her eyes are beginning to mist at the edges but she strains, listens. The sound that cuts through the haze is not the scream she dreads, Kara’s agony as her veins sear emerald. It’s not a scream, but a shout, and then a blur passes over her like light and shadow.

Concrete cracks, or perhaps it’s Lena’s ribs. Sounds are muffled now, the world dulled down like the inside of a snow globe. Underwater, time passes sluggishly to where she lies, drifting, encased in glass. But someone is fighting the current, resisting the pull. Hands grasp her shoulders, burning where they touch. Through the rolling fog comes Kara’s face, blurring out in red and blue and gold and sickly green. Lena wants to push her away, keep her separate from the venomous substance protruding from her chest, keep her untainted. But Kara’s hands are dancing there-away along her cheeks, her jaw, Lena’s own name sounding from her lips over and over, a siren song, calling her home. It’s raining now, wet spots peppering her brow, or maybe the sun is crying.

“Lena, Lena,” Kara is saying. It sounds like her heartbeat and she cannot bear for it to stop.

“Kara,” she manages, a whisper, a prayer.

Her face flashes within Lena’s line of sight for one perfect moment, and is she green-tinged or is it Lena’s failing vision? A shiver passes through the air between them, I’m sorry fluttering like a bloodstained white flag but whether it falls from her own lips or another’s, Lena cannot say. Then a sudden pressure at her ribs, a heavy push and release that feels like salvation and damnation all at once.

Lena hears a scream, two screams, billions. She is left gaping, open and exposed. Invaded by the air and exalted by the sticky-sweet blush of her own blood, her body purging itself. Through the slick of gathering crimson her head rolls to the side, darkness pressing in around her, eyes blazing with the final image of a limp hand on the ground beside her, veins shot through with glowing green.

-

For a long time, there is only darkness. The deepest blackness she has ever known, all-encompassing. Devouring light, thought, feeling. Lena floats, tethered to her own existence only by the pressing weight of the dark, closing in until the end of the world.

Slowly, sensations begin to blur in and out. Cold, a deadening flow, hooking into her very marrow and stripping her from the inside out. She drifts, and then there’s heat, scorching, radiating out from her ribs in scalding waves, and she wishes for numbness.

For a moment, Lena thinks she sees the star-burst of veins behind her eyelids, but then they are gone and all is black again. Sound fragments filter through her peripheral awareness. A great noise, banging and shouting and exploding. She slips back under.

Vibrations reach her, but they must be sounds because Lena no longer has a body with which to feel them. She floats, untethered, sinking beneath the surface of a dark ocean so vast it surely cannot know she’s there. In the deep, voices flicker.

“Haven’t you heard that you’re supposed to leave the knife in? She’s minutes from bleeding out.”

The blackness turns to blood around her, not vibrant red but sticky dark, the kind so loaded with the very force of someone’s life that it moves slowly, crawls under the weight of it, sucking light from all it touches.

“Her veins were green, Alex.”

An eternity passes.

She dreams of her mother, dark hair fanning behind her as she cuts through the still waters of the lake. The scene is calm, but the growing dread means Lena knows what’s coming and suddenly it’s not her mother but Kara before her, and the lake isn’t clear but radioactive, glowing green, and still Lena stands at the shore and watches her slip away, helpless.

Words float through the haze and Lena wishes she could reach out, grasp them, weigh them in her hands to know the truth behind them. Radiation and poisoned and flared and gone, the sounds making physical shapes in the darkness. She thinks of a child, two dark-haired children, of hours spent pouring over a dictionary. A cruel laugh when she got a definition wrong, grudging silence when she got it right. How she wishes now to be wrong, to mishear, a stay of judgment on the world these words conjure into being. But the focus is gone, and she slips away again.

“—whatever you have to do! Or so help me, I’ll—”

Though Lena is nothing now, just an exhale in the wind, she smiles. Warmth blooms, the blackness not crushing but caressing for a moment, and she drifts into memories of happier times.

A million years pass, a billion. Lena is upside down, and right way up, and no way up at all. If she still had a face, she might feel the pressure of a warm forehead against her own. If she still had hair, the imprint of lips pressed gently against it might still ache. If she hadn’t burned every meaningful bridge in her life in the year before her death, she might believe the trick of a whisper wrapping on the breeze, words of comfort, of promise.

But she had, so she doesn’t, and time collapses in on itself as Lena watches, motionless and alone.

-

Though she has always been nowhere, she can feel herself drifting further and further from the last thing that might just resemble a somewhere. The eons slow. If she were a doctor, Lena thinks, then this would be the time to make herself comfortable. To say her goodbyes.

She cannot look at blackness any longer, cannot bear the glowing green after-image that seems to stick to every corner and edge. She thinks of blue, of rain-washed skies and Kara’s eyes, conjures it into being with every fibre she has left. Wraps herself up in it, plunges headfirst, drowns.

“Like it matters!” Kara says, no, shouts, from somewhere far above and below her. Lena would flinch, if only she still had a body. The voice rings out through the void. “Like any of it matters now.”

Lena is privately inclined to agree. She tries to breathe, but the full weight of the universe, of every universe, presses in. As everything, even the blackness, dulls, there emerges a crushing, cracking suffocation, and Lena wonders why she can’t even die in peace. A high-pitched scream, maybe hers, maybe Kara’s, maybe her mother’s, maybe the world’s, stretching out before her like a pathway. Though there’s no doubt where it ends, Lena almost wants to follow it, if only to escape this sensation of being crumbled, submerged, denied life as its very essence is wrung from her being.

And then a hundred trillion bolts of lightning shoot through her at once, and Lena is gone.

-

When she wakes, she wakes secure in the knowledge that she must be alive. Sure that the pain that had burst through her, blighted every nerve with an agony so intense she feels its phantom grip even now, could only lead back to life. Sure that no departure could hurt that much.

When she wakes, it is through cracked, dry eyes to the sight of pipes and ceiling vents, the bland, industrial grey that can only denote underfunded government property.

When she wakes, Kara is standing at the foot of her bed, hands behind her back and looking every inch the righteous hero, and Lena’s unsteady heart sinks. She’s been on the receiving end of this authoritative pose more than enough for one lifetime. At least her hands aren’t on her hips.

But Kara’s eyes brighten as they meet Lena’s fluttering gaze. “Lena.” Quiet, reverential. “How are you feeling?”

Lena takes stock. Alive, to begin with. Every limb still intact. Aside from an unnerving constriction in her chest and the fact that her blood feels a little like it’s burning her cells as it courses through her veins, it could certainly be worse.

When she speaks her voice is hoarse, cracking. “What happened?”

The same darkness creeps into the edges of her vision as she listens to Kara list the extent of the damage. She presses her lips together, willing away the blackness, registering only snippets.

Stab wound. Kryptonite poisoning. Collapsed lung. Cardiac arrest. Resuscitation.

Leviathan, gone. Andrea, captured. Lex, escaped.

The words wash over her like a freezing tide, and Lena wonders if maybe the darkness had been easier after all.

It takes far longer than it should for her to realise that the room has fallen silent. Kara is watching her, concern etched into her features like tears carving through stone.

Lena swallows as best she can. “And you?”

A corner of Kara’s mouth quirks up. “I’m fine. Thanks to you.”

But she doesn’t look fine. She looks exhausted, her face drawn, blue eyes lacking their characteristic shine. Even her hero’s stance can’t mask the fatigue weighing heavy on her shoulders.

But Lena doesn’t have the strength to argue the point. She rolls her head to the side, joints popping and releasing, noticing for the first time the tangle of IV lines threading into her skin. She lifts her other hand to touch them, feels the warning tug of more needles even as Kara steps forward, arms raised as if to stop her.

Her hands reach toward Lena, or at least, the spaces where her hands should be. Huge white dressings swaddle Kara from the wrists down, so bulky they do not resemble hands at all. Lena’s breath catches in her lungs as she takes in the unwieldy bandages, third degree burns and possible nerve damage echoing through her mind and she understands now why Kara had hidden them behind her back.

The inhale she aims for seems to stick in her ribs and she can feel again the crushing, the cracking, the dizzying lack of oxygen as her head spins. Kara is by her side in an instant, radiating warmth and just breathe, Lena, it’s okay, a comforting weight settling against her hip. Lena thanks the thick blanket for blurring the press of rough bandages where there should be warm skin, softening it into something just nondescript enough to be calming.

When her pounding pulse has slowed, the heart monitor downgrading to a less frenetic beat, she sucks in a breath despite her lungs’ protestation, waits for her vision to clear. Kara is still there, and dread opens up in Lena’s chest.

“You— you touched it. The kryptonite. You pulled it out.”

Kara doesn’t move, doesn’t speak. Just nods, her gaze locked on Lena’s own. Lena lies catatonic, paralysed with the knowledge, unable to move even as Alex enters the room. Dimly aware of low words exchanged between the two sisters and then Alex at her bedside, gentler than Lena’s been worthy of seeing her in years. Just rest, Lena, the press of a button on the IV monitor, and she sinks back into oblivion.