Chapter Text
Coming out as Supergirl in a world exclusive interview with Cat Grant had done very little to minimize Kara Danvers’s to-do list. Despite the countless villains, invaders, and just garden variety idiots that she’d dealt with very publicly for years, there was always one more bad guy with a dream and bad breath who wanted to wreak havoc that only a superhero could fix.
Coupled with the Editor-In-Chief role, a neverending carousel of meetings that could have been emails, and emails that should have been a private chat with a medical professional, it was no wonder that even a superpowered alien was feeling extra tired.
Actually, exhausted would be closer to the truth. For the first time outside of losing her powers, Kara could feel the weight of each day dragging her to bed each night. Sleep had usually recharged her as readily as the sun, but most mornings lately she woke up feeling as though she had barely closed her eyes.
Still, the news and intergalactic crime waited for no woman. Kara gave both of them everything she had, and tried not to lose any more much-needed sleep wondering why the effects were getting to her so easily.
All of which was working fine, really, until one teensy tiny mistimed swoop to avoid a bolt of lightning from a low-grade Leslie ripoff resulted in Kara landing hard in CatCo Plaza. The mildly undignified flopping around like a fish didn’t exactly help the note of panic in Alex’s voice as she ordered Kara scooped up and transported to the DEO.
It wasn’t a big deal to let Alex run a few tests, after all. She loved the science of it all, so Kara was happy to give her a new project. Until the first round of tests caused Kara to do something she almost never did: throw up all over her supersuit and shiny red boots. She realized in that moment that something very new and different was wrong, and so did Alex because her next move was to pick up the phone to their mother.
********
“Oh come on!” Kara struggled to keep her voice down. “Are you kidding me? I’m literally—literally!—bulletproof.”
Alex just shrugged at her. “Well it’s not a bullet you failed to dodge, Kara. In fact, this was a whole other kind of shooting—“
”Ew!” Kara resisted the urge to clap her hands over her ears.
Eliza stepped in to keep the peace, just like when they were teenagers fighting over who got to pick the music in the car. “Alex, don’t be crude on top of everything else.”
”Sorry, mom. Kara just has to remember that her genius mom and genius sister dropped everything for nearly the whole weekend to come up with the first ever Kryptonian pregnancy test. Yeah, you’re welcome for that, by the way.”
Kara slammed her head down on the metal surface of Alex’s workbench at the new and improved DEO. It left a dent, but she couldn’t bring herself to care.
“This isn’t possible. It can’t be possible. How does something like this even happen?” Kara was more than aware that her questions had devolved into whining, but there was nothing to be done about it.
“Well, sometimes when a boy alien and a girl alien hook up one last time because he says he’s never coming back from the future again… ta-da?” Alex made a pitying attempt at jazz hands, but the concern in her brown eyes was definitely sincere.
“We did theorize that this might be possible,” Eliza said, rubbing circles between Kara’s shoulder blades. “With the right conditions. That was before we had any idea about Daxamites. I always said that boy was trouble.”
“I just got back to CatCo. I just started my dream job as Editor-in-Chief. And I’m never going to see this baby’s father again. This is not how any of this was supposed to happen.”
Alex and Eliza shared some kind of pointed glance before Alex took a deep breath and spoke once more.
”You did say that you felt everyone else was moving on with their lives around you. Starting a family, or pursuing the things that matter to them. Maybe this is just the second part of you doing that? You’ve never needed a guy for anything, Kar. Why would this be any different?”
Kara stood up, ducking away from the hug that Alex instantly offered her. Instead, Kara made for the open window and to one of two balconies in National City that she knew would always be open to her. It was time to visit the other.
“I need some time,” Kara said. “I don’t know what options are even going to be possible for me, but whatever happens I need to be sure about it. I’m going to fly around for a bit, clear my head.”
”You can always stay and talk it out with us?” Eliza offered, but Alex was clearly itching to get back to her own - very much anticipated and wanted - family.
“You’ve already done so much.” Kara paused to hug them both after all, drawing every ounce of comfort that she could. But the faint sounds of a familiar heartbeat that had been missing from the city for too long were tugging at Kara more strongly by the second.
To sort out her head, and hell, her life, there was only one place she needed to be.
******
Kara hadn’t entirely ruled out that Cat Grant had psychic powers, but her standing on the newly restored CatCo balcony with a glass of the finest Scotch in hand was probably just an old habit rather than expecting Supergirl to swoop in.
Even after their groundbreaking exclusive interview revealing Kara’s full identity to the world, she still chose to fly in her supersuit. It kept a sort of line between on and off duty, and being needed a bit less as a superhero these days was bittersweet. And if there really was a baby on the way—with Alex 99% sure about the test result—then Kara might be juggling three important jobs instead of just the two.
“All quiet out there tonight?” Cat nodded towards the lights of the city, not looking at Kara as she landed.
“As much as a bustling city can be. Nothing they need me for; not yet anyway.”
”So you came to… what? Catch up on your admin? You could do the tedious little details from that rent-controlled loft of yours, no?” Cat flicked a glance in Kara’s direction, but refused to let it linger.
“No, I mean… I guess I could go to my office. But I wanted to run something past you. About CatCo, and uh, its policies?”
Cat threw back the last mouthful of liquid in her glass before striding across the balcony and sitting in one of the swish design piece chairs she had picked out in the refurb after the latest failed attempt to demolish most of the downtown area.
“I thought I had an HR department for that sort of thing. Surely you’re not trying to wheedle more vacation days out of me already, Keira? You just signed the contract after all.”
Kara couldn’t help but stare at Cat in this new, slightly rumpled way that she had about her since returning. Saving the world, or at least the coral reefs and a dozen other urgent new causes had relaxed the crisp lines and power dressing that Cat had so favored back when Kara was her assistant. There was something softer about her now, from the salt-water curl to her hair to the ethical fabrics that made up her exclusive and designer wardrobe.
“Not exactly, no. I was just, well, I never really had cause to look at some of the policies before. You have to understand, there were some I just didn’t think would ever be relevant to me.”
Rao, Kara missed her glasses sometimes. In awkward moments like this, fiddling with the tortoiseshell frames had been a surefire way of grounding herself. As much as someone who could fly could ever truly be grounded.
Cat motioned to the matching chair opposite, indicating that Kara should sit.
In the name of diffusing what felt like a sudden tension between them, Kara did as directed, kicking her red Supergirl boots up on the low table between them. Maybe it would make her look more relaxed than she felt.
Maybe she should have stayed and talked to Eliza and Alex, or gone home with them to get the bonus of Kelly’s advice as well. Seeing Esme might have helped remind Kara that this sea change in her life didn’t have to be so terrifying. Assuming a Kryptonian pregnancy on Earth could ever get that far.
“I hope I’m not about to have to send you on some kind of seminar for inappropriate behavior at work, Keira—“
”Can we not, just tonight? The name thing is funny and all, but I know you know what to call me. You knew I was Supergirl all that time, don’t tell me Cat Grant can’t get a simple four letters right. You managed it on television.”
Cat smirked at that. “True, I always have been quite deadly with certain four-letter words. Now, what career advice could you possibly need that you wouldn’t go and work it out with one of your… Merry Men? Sidekicks? Or do you have some sort of Avengers, only it’s more about spreading hope than avenging anything? That seems on brand.”
”It’s true, I went to my sister first. And my foster mom, Eliza. I suppose I could have gone around all of my friends, from Lena to Nia. I’m not even sure that any human can understand what I’m trying to work out, and yet any time the chips are really down, it seems you’re the person that I fly to, Miss Grant.”
”Let’s make a deal, then.” Cat leaned forward, swatting Kara’s feet until she placed them back on the floor. “If I can remember to call you Kara, you have to start calling me Cat. Miss Grant is all well and good from the freshly-graduated intern. From the shiny new Editor-in-Chief, with all that experience and superpowers? Well, that makes me feel older than even an extra shot of Botox can offset. Unacceptable.”
“Okay, Cat.” Kara twined her fingers in her lap, for the first time missing her skirt and tights. A hem would be something to fidget with, both comfort and distraction.
“Kara…” Cat rarely trailed off mid-sentence, unless she was putting the pieces of something together. “Are you leaving?”
“Leaving?” Kara was stunned at the thought. “Why would you… what?”
“I know what it’s like to make one major decision and then jump in another direction entirely. To dive, remember? Is that what all this restlessness is about? You want to leave… what? CatCo? National City? Don’t tell me you mean Earth.”
Kara gripped the arms of her chair. “Leaving is the last thing I can do right now.”
“It would be possible, though. Don’t your little gang jump around in time? Bored of waiting for the new iPhone so you thought you’d skip a couple of centuries? I’d be tempted. If only to skip past the wait between seasons of Stranger Things.”
“Right? Their production gaps are a joke,” Kara seized on one of her favorite subjects. So what if she over-identified with Eleven? The media wasn’t exactly teeming with lonely-girl-in-a-strange-world representation, even now. “But no, I can’t go forward in time, not without giving up my family and everything else I have here.”
Cat stood at that point, striding inside to pour herself another generous measure, swirling the glass as she returned. “You should tell me what terrible alien diesel oil you drink, then you could take the edge off at the end of a long workday too.”
”I’m not a big fan of it anyway. And it’s partly to blame for the situation I’m in now. No, you know what? That isn’t even fair. If I don’t do anything else today, I guess I gotta start taking responsibility.”
”Good idea, Kara. You know how I enjoy people talking in riddles to me, taking the least efficient way to the point. A winning strategy.”
”Sorry. I just… I don’t even know if I can say it. I always assumed it wasn’t going to be an option for me, but here I am.”
”You’re sick?”
”No. No! I’m, oh Rao, I’m pregnant.”
Cat blinked once, twice. Well, at least Kara had achieved another first—rendering Cat Grant speechless.
“And I assume this means the other party is someone from the guest cast of the X-Files, too?” Cat found her words after all. “As in, alien?”
All Kara could do was nod.
”Well I don’t think it was your flasher friend, so that leaves the failed intern… what was his name? Spike?”
Kara choked on the water she’d just taken a sip of. Like most women her age, Spike could only mean one leather-coat-wearing vampire, and the very image was enough to short-circuit her brain for a moment.
”Mike. Well, his name is Mon-El, actually.”
”And where is he, this Mono?”
”Gone. For good, this time. He’s needed in the future, and he can’t come back.” Kara felt the finality this time when she said it. A tiny part of her had been holding out hope, was waiting to be proven wrong. But saying it to Cat’s unimpressed expression made it all seem more real.
”Huh.” Cat tilted her head to one side, solving another puzzle before Kara could prevent it. “And yet I thought Nia’s verdant paramour was part of the same little gang.”
”Brainy? Well, yeah, he is. But—“
”But he decided to come back for Nia. Just for her specifically? I believe that’s what she told me when I saw that sparkly engagement ring. Not quite a diamond, but it makes Taylor’s rock look like it came out of a gumball machine.”
Kara rubbed the tip of her nose, which always tingled right before she was about to cry. “I guess that’s different. They’re different.”
”What’s that phrase I coined that the internet latched onto? I know, it’s hard to narrow down. But I think in this case it’s necessary. Oh yes: if he wanted to, he would.”
”I think that was actually just a thing that went viral on TikTok, Cat.”
That was enough to make Cat pout. “They had to get it from somewhere, Kara. Keep up.”
Kara stood again, too restless to be contained to a chair. The whip and crack of her cape in the bluster that always circled the top floors of the CatCo building sounded as frazzled as her nerves.
“This wasn’t supposed to happen. Not like this.”
”And you have choices, I assume?” Cat came to stand behind Kara, hesitating for a second before gripping her shoulder in support. “The full range of choices, just like a human would?”
”Who knows?” Kara bit back a deflated little laugh. “Was it easier for you? It’s like the thought itself is so big I can’t look directly at it. Like I can’t get both hands around it? And considering my powers, that’s insane to me.”
”That sounds about right, regardless of what planet you come from.” Cat sighed, but her hold on Kara didn’t waver. “Carter was so planned, so tried for, and even then it threw me. And with Adam, I think I was in denial for so long… anyway. I don’t think there’s any way to do this that doesn’t blow your mind once you realize what it actually means.”
“Assuming I even can. My sister ran a whole battery of tests, but I can tell she’s worried. There’s so much about my physiology that’s just guesswork and hope.”
“Could this pregnancy… is there a chance it could hurt you? Or worse?” Cat turns Kara towards her, moving her as easily as a feather on the breeze. Now she has both hands on Kara’s shoulders, her gaze unwavering as she meets Kara’s eyes. “Tell me, honestly.”
“I guess it could.” Kara admitted what she’d been trying not to say since her first suspicions that something was going on with her body. “But even if it doesn’t, how can I be sure I’m supposed to be a mother? If anything, I always thought I would adopt.”
“A wonderful choice. But all of this doesn’t have to be solved in one night,” Cat reminded her with that softness so many others would never get to see. “And you don’t have to go back to an empty apartment.”
“Is this your way of asking for a flying ride home?” Kara couldn’t help but smile, because Cat’s hints about how much she liked the personal flight experience had been about as subtle as a sledgehammer ever since Kara had swooped in to save her from a crashing Air Force One.
”Well, isn’t that an idea? Carter is with his father, so you’ll be company for me. If you want to be, that is. You can hide out in a guest bedroom if you prefer.”
”I think I’d rather have your company. If that’s okay?” Kara was all too aware of how close they were standing, how Cat still hadn’t let her go. Had they always been this bad at personal space? Kara supposes they must have been, because she could recall every graze of their hands or reassuring hug in perfect detail.
”Of course it is. And I’m going to say it, whether you want me to or not.”
”What?” Kara choked down a fresh surge of panic.
“Isn’t it obvious, Supergirl?” Cat shifted position, jumping in the air just enough for Kara’s reflexes to kick in and scoop her into the bridal carry. “Up, up, and away!”