Chapter 1: Where There's Smoke…
"Kara, we're detecting pyrokinetic activity outside…"
"I'm on it!"
Kara interrupted Winn's transmission before he had time to finish his sentence. Like a bolt of blue, she shot across the sky. In a flash, she was on the street where the blaze was burning.
In the midst of the conflagration stood a woman, slim and sharp-eyed, with flowing red hair that cascaded down her back like tongues of flame.
The woman smirked. "I had a sneaking suspicion you'd show up, Supergirl," she said smugly. Then she hurled a blast of fire at Kara that knocked her off her feet. "You can call me Volcana!"
Ignoring Winn's exasperated comment that Volcana was a good name and he wished he had thought of it first, Kara rose to her feet. The flames were all around her, spreading through the street. Citizens were rushing here and there in panic.
With a forceful gust of icy breath, Kara quelled the fire. She ushered people to safety, then turned to face Volcana.
Volcana, however, was nowhere to be seen. Transforming herself into a ball of fire, she had spirited herself away. Kara could see a distant streak of orange against the brilliant blue of the sky.
This was a diversion, Kara thought to herself. Other than cause a fire, she didn't do anything. She didn't rob anything from the stores, didn't take anything from the people. I even put her fire out in seconds. She could have done so much more damage if she simply wanted to burn a section of the city and cause panic.
This area wasn't her target. She's after something else.
Leaping into the air, Kara pursued her new enemy. She surged forward at incredible speed, chasing her through the heavens. As Kara drew closer to her adversary, she saw what seemed to be the woman's figure transfigured into flame – not merely shrouded in fire, but made of it and glowing brightly.
Volcana struck Kara with another blast, sending her spinning for a moment in the air. In another moment, Kara regained her bearings and blew an icy blast at Volcana, but Volcana dodged the freezing breath with a mocking laugh.
"Is that all you've got?" Volcana taunted.
Kara lunged at her, but as she did, she found herself trapped in a whirlwind of fire. Volcana had stirred up what seemed like a small cyclone of fire in the air beneath Kara's feet. It snaked around her legs, swirling faster and faster and rising higher and higher until Kara was engulfed. All she could see was a barrage of orange, gold, and crimson. With a frustrated sigh, Kara tore through the flaming whirlwind. She may not have been seared by the inferno, but in that short delay, she had lost sight of Volcana.
"J'onn, Winn, Alex," Kara asked of her allies back at the DEO, "any word on who this is? Where she might be heading?"
Winn's voice came through the communicator, droll as if reading from a computer screen: "…Tracked the name 'Volcana' and… voila! Claire Selton… displayed pyrokinetic abilities as a teenager… parents sent her to the Center for Paranormal Studies in Metropolis… then she drops off the radar and… oh. Oh! This… This is not good…"
"What? What is it?" Kara demanded.
"According to files that were declassified after Cadmus went rogue, Selton was seized by government operatives not long after her arrival at the institution. Cadmus tried to make her a living weapon, an assassin they could send out on covert operations to do their bidding. That's where she got the name Volcana, it's a codename. But Cadmus' efforts to control her didn't take. Says here she lashed out at them, that she became increasingly violent towards her captors, particularly the leader of the operation…"
"Lillian Luthor," Kara murmured sullenly.
"Lillian Luthor, who is currently imprisoned far from National City, but…"
The thought struck Kara like lightning. She felt a constriction in her chest.
"Lena!"
Kara could hear Winn, J'onn, and her sister telling her to remain calm. No doubt they could sense the panic in her voice. No doubt J'onn could feel her panic as it rose within her. Their words echoed in her head, rattled there, but did not settle. She could not take them to heart, could not be calm. Lena was in danger! With Lillian and Lex locked away, Volcana had only this Luthor to let loose her anger upon! It was a blind, wrathful, unthinking impulse on Volcana's part… but Kara saw no other reason why the villainess would be in National City! Who knew what a volatile former assassin, seething with righteous anger and a desire for vengeance, might be capable of?
Heart pounding in her chest, Kara zoomed to Lena's penthouse. She had no intention of seeing its great windows shattered, shards of glass showering the carpet; of seeing smoke billowing from the building and flames devouring the place. She was faster than Volcana. She was Supergirl. She would make it there in time.
Trepidation coursed through her.
She had to make it there in time.
Kara shot through the air like a bullet, breathing a sigh of relief when Lena's penthouse came into view. So far, it was undisturbed. Its windows were unbroken. No cloud of smoke curled into the air. The door to the patio was open, letting in the warm air of the day. Kara alighted there and marched into Lena's home, her only thought being to warn her of the incoming threat.
"Miss Luthor, you have to get out of here – quickly! We have reason to believe that a pyrokinetic metahuman may be targeting you in retaliation for you mother's act- Oh! Oh my gosh!"
Lena Luthor was in her living room naked as the day she was born.
Kara began blushing furiously, immediately losing her aura of composure. "You… you… you're naked! Oh my! My goodness!" she stammered and started to to babble like a tongue-tied Kara Danvers instead of speaking with the authority of Supergirl.
"What I choose to wear in the privacy of my home is my own affair, Supergirl," Lena responded briskly. "I certainly don't expect Kryptonians to come swooping in unexpectedly."
She moved toward a closet, probably with the intention of putting something on so that she could flee the building, but a sizzling hiss outside the door made her stop in mid-stride.
Something slid through the keyhole, red like a fiery salamander. The tongue of flame grew into a pillar of fire that steadily took on a woman's shape. Within seconds, Volcana was standing before them both.
"Lena Luthor," Volcana drawled, "daughter of Lillian Luthor and CEO of L-Corp…" She sneered, surveying Lena. "Is this what you'd call the CEO's New Clothes?"
"New?" Lena replied glibly. "No, I've had this suit since day one, actually. I'm rather fond of it."
"It'd be a shame to damage it, then!" Volcana spat. "After all, it's irreplaceable!"
Volcana sent a torrent of flame hurtling at Lena, but it never touched her. Kara placed herself like a wall between Lena and the woman who meant her harm, remaining rooted to the spot even as the flames struck her. She would not let Lena be hurt. She refused to let Lena be hurt. She withstood the blast like a thing indomitable. Previously, Kara had let Volcana's blasts knock her off balance, but here – here as she stood as Lena's last defense – she planted herself like a tree, taking the force of Volcana's fury in place of her.
"Claire… please…" Kara pleaded, holding off the flames. "You don't want to do this. Lena isn't her mother."
At the sound of her true name, Volcana paused. Some long-lost innocence resurfaced in her face – but only fleetingly. It was gone as it had come.
"She's the next best thing!" Volcana screamed suddenly – and the fires that were dying on her fingertips were fed anew. Yet, they seemed more erratic than before. Instead of surging forth and unifying into one direct blast, they came in short bursts. Like the previous stream of fire Volcana had directed at Kara and Lena, these bursts were violent. The floor shook with each new explosion. In spite of their violence, though, the bursts were less continual than one long stream of fire. The iron resolve that had allowed Volcana to channel her power so well was cracking, cracking ever so slightly. If the manifestation of Volcana's powers was not enough to prove it, the desperation in Volcana's voice surely did. It was as if she was trying to reaffirm her cause to herself as she hurled her retort back at Kara.
"Claire. Claire." Sensing Volcana's connection to her true name, Kara repeated it. Clearly. Deliberately. Firmly. "Claire, listen to me. Cadmus tried to make you a living weapon but you fought against them. You resisted them. You broke free. You made a decision not to do their dirty work. You made a choice, a moral choice. 'Volcana'? That's not you, that's just a label they gave you while trying to make you what you're not. I know you're in agony. I know you feel like you need to release that pain somehow, but please… not like this… not like this…"
Kara stood tall, cape spread wide to absorb the spurts of flame, a living shield for Lena. Her voice was sonorous and mellow, earnest and kind although fraught with fear.
The hint of tears gleamed in Volcana's golden eyes.
"Claire?"
Lena now spoke, stepping forward from behind Kara's cape. She looked like a goddess from sculpture or art, like Artemis the Huntress, standing there despite the peril. At the same time, she seemed soft. Vulnerable. Human.
"Claire," Lena said softly, "what Cadmus did to you was unforgiveable. What my mother did to you was unforgiveable. I know the cruelty my mother is capable of… I've… I've experienced some of it firsthand… and I could have let my pain and anger consume me, but I didn't. There have been times in my life I've felt so alone, felt like I had no one but myself – and what was I? My mother made me feel not merely unloved but unlovable, like there was something wrong in me that couldn't escape… and if I couldn't escape it, then I might as well just embrace the darkness my mother made me see in myself. But I couldn't… I couldn't bring myself to do that. I can't bring myself to do that. I won't do that. If I ever did that, I'd be letting my mother win. Claire, I know you feel like you have no one out there but yourself and that by using tactics Cadmus taught you you're using the master's tools to dismantle the master's house… but Claire… if we want to fight what my mother stands for, we have to be better than her… Claire, please… You're not alone."
The more Lena spoke, the more the jets of flame at Volcana's fingertips began to fade. Kara still stood cautiously, bracing herself for another outburst, but it did not come.
When Lena finally finished speaking, Volcana's great rage was gone from her.
Kara took Volcana by the hand.
Volcana did not resist.
As they waited the short eternity for the authorities to arrive, Kara felt a great relief in her heart. She glanced over at Lena, hoping to lock eyes with her and find comfort in a relief so like her own. Lena had discreetly removed herself from the scene, however, and soon enough Kara saw her emerging from her bedroom in a sundress.
The great duress they had been under had made Kara all but forget Lena's nudity, but now she dearly wished she could suppress the blush returning to her cheeks.
She could hardly wrap her head around the whole scenario she had walked in on. What on earth?!
As Supergirl, Kara could not demand answers of Lena. After all, Lena did not yet know that her closest friend was actually Supergirl. No matter how noble and good Supergirl was, she seemed aloof to Lena Luthor.
As Kara Danvers, on the other hand, Kara could get to the bottom of this. The next time she visited Lena out of costume, she promised herself she would ask.
As delicately as possible.
Naturally, when reporting back to the DEO, Kara made no mention of Lena's attire (or lack thereof).
Author's Note: Since this is my first foray into fanfiction, I would be delighted to hear what you think. Please review!
One of the things I love about Supergirl is her compassion for her foes as much as her friends, and I wanted that compassion and optimism to shine through in this first chapter as well as touch upon Lena's painful connection to her mother.
And as for... that aspect... of the chapter, it's a plot point, I promise. It's not just there to be random.