A/N: Holiday gift written for Cherepashka.
Editing support thank you to fmorgana!
An Overwrought Metaphor
The sea is not as salty as it used to be. This, among other things, was predicted by the scientists.
In the years leading up to the end of the world, a lot of things were predicted by a lot of scientists.
The astrophysicists predicted life on Mars, which was quite exciting to the public but not really news to the DEO.
A prominent chemist in Canada predicted the imminent discovery of the secret of transmuting lead into gold – this did terrible things to the price of gold, even after it was revealed that the "prominent chemist in Canada" was a thirteen year old boy in Montana running a fake news site.
Several sociologists then predicted that the public had lost its ability to distinguish fiction from truth. This got a lot of likes on social media but was mostly ignored because the article didn't apply to anyone who read it.
In the midst of all this hubbub, the scientists in charge of the climate change crusade hadn't been loud enough, hadn't been flashy enough, hadn't gotten the public fired up enough – possibly on account of all the leading researchers in the field being turned into alien food during the Svalbard incident, but mostly on account of widespread apathy and disbelief – to avert the apocalypse.
By the time anyone listened to the scientist's talk of a "misplaced decimal point for rate of accelerating Antarctic glacial melt," it was, as they say, too damn late.
Alex and the remaining DEO agents often tell the joke about Superman and his super tears when the Fortress of Solitude melted and all his toys slipped into the ocean. They tell this joke again and again and again because, in the wake of the apocalypse, the standards for humor displayed an inverse relationship to the rising sea level.
As Alex guides her slim patrol boat around the perimeter of what remains of downtown National City, the memory of driving down asphalt roads and walking on concrete sidewalks fifteen stories down is surreal.
For the most part, humanity has retreated to what were once foothills and mountains on the other side of the state. Those foothills and mountains are now islands with significant tracts of beachfront property. Unfortunately for the land's owners though, given the surplus, beaches aren't exactly in high demand.
The only people left in and around National City are scavengers, aliens, alien scavengers, and the DEO.
Well.
What's left of the DEO.
It's hard to be a government agency without a government and there's not much of a government anymore. Around the time the sea levels had risen twenty feet, the president revealed herself to be a shapeshifting extraterrestrial amphibian with a fondness for the tropics. Things went downhill from there.
In spite of all this, Alex and the remaining DEO agents, and Kara, when she's not busy trying to keep the peace on the various islands of humanity upstate, patrol National City.
There's too much dangerous technology, human and alien both, lying under the waves here. The DEO has made efforts to recover some of it, but there's too much they don't know about and they don't have the resources to store it all anyway. So they patrol the area and they protect human scavengers and they strongly discourage anyone dredging up anything too much like a military grade weapon.
Today, the sea is quiet.
Or, it is until an enormous wave comes out of nowhere and threatens to capsize Alex's slim patrol boat. A second blue-green wave follows the first and that's all the prompting Alex needs to urge her boat's motor to life and head into the third wave. As she crests it, she gets a good view of the surrounding area and the direction the waves are coming from.
Judging from the dilapidated husks of downtown skyscrapers, it looks like she's headed towards the old CatCo building.
CatCo… Cat Grant might have had the wherewithal to focus on stopping the apocalypse instead of promoting the Guardian endlessly. Maybe. She'd definitely have run stories about global warming if climate change had been Supergirl's villain of the week.
Jimmy did try his best.
Bless his heart.
Alex's onboard radio crackles to life. "There's something dead ahead," Winn says. He's back at the DEO – their sixth string backup base had been conveniently located inside the top of a nearby mountain. "Right by the old CatCo building. Uh – something dead ahead - meaning in front of you, not something dead."
Alex rolls her eyes and taps the button on the radio to reply. "Ten-four. Over."
Winn took the apocalypse better than most, probably on account of hooking up with Mon-El a few months after the president absconded to the Bermuda triangle to hatch her brood of eggs, never to be heard from again.
Alex still owes J'onn a drink for that – never take hookup bets against a telepath. The drink is supposed to come from M'gann's bar. M'gann's bar that is now buried under a hundred fifty feet of water.
As what's left of the CatCo building looms ahead, rising out of the water like some strange steel and glass monument to all humanity's lost hopes and dreams, Alex slows her boat and veers to the side, setting a course to circle the building. The sea is still choppy and-
With the motor quiet now, she hears shouting, gunfire, more shouting, more gunfire.
Alex increases her speed as much as she dares in the close quarters of National City's former downtown. She crouches down in her small boat, minimizing her target. "Cover" isn't really a thing on the open ocean, but her vessel has proved as bulletproof as a car door in the past.
When Alex rounds the last corner of the building, she finds the fight is over.
There's an enormous dead alien floating in the water, bleeding wine-dark blood into the blue-green sea. The alien has a lot of tentacles and is riddled with even more bullet holes.
On the other side of the dead alien is a boat that's quite similar to Alex's and in that boat is a woman wearing a very fetching leather jacket.
It looks like something that might very well have come from Alex's own closet – before the apocalypse, that is. These days, she tends to wear standard issue DEO fatigues. Her remaining leather jacket is precious. There aren't many cows left in the world.
Alex stops her boat outside of easy shooting range and peers at the other woman. She looks very familiar. Who does Alex know who wears fetching leather jackets? Or – who did Alex know? Ever since the end of the world, she hasn't gone out much.
"Alex!" Maggie shouts.
Oh.
Ohhhhh.
Oh.
OH.
oh dear.
Alex's radio cuts in. "Alex? What's going on? Did you find the disturbance?" Winn asks.
Alex only barely hears him. She has more important things on her mind.
"Maggie?" Alex shouts back. "What are you doing out here?"
Alex has not seen Maggie in a very long time. The last time Alex saw Maggie… things… were… awkward...
Maggie points at a large boat full of humans that's hastily motoring itself off towards the islands and relative safety. "I'm protecting scavengers from aliens," she says. "Like I have been since the start of the apocalypse. What are you doing out here?"
Alex is by no means a coward which means that the only plausible explanation for her sudden urge to turn her boat around and run after the scavengers is a fierce determination to defend humanity. "DEO business," Alex calls out. "Why haven't we seen you around here before?"
Maggie shrugs. Her fetching leather jacket is well-oiled and gleams in the sun. "You feds are single minded," she answers.
Alex is tongue-tied trying to figure out the best way to refute that when all that comes to mind are various admissions and concessions.
Maggie decides to guide her boat over so that they're only a few meters away from one another. "Hey, what's your frequency?" Maggie asks.
"Alex? Alex?" Winn asks from the radio.
Alex pushes the radio to reply. "Winn, I'm fine. Ran into Maggie. I'll debrief at the base. Over."
"Maggie? Oooooo," goes Winn on the radio. "Ooooooooo-
Alex goes bright red and pretends Winn said nothing. She switches the radio to a different frequency. "Do you have something to write it down with?" she asks.
Maggie smiles. Her teeth are amazing. She must have saved a lot of toothpaste during the evacuation. "I'll remember if you tell me," she says.
Alex's ears are on fire. Metaphorical fire. She manages to tell Maggie the radio frequency she just switched to without tripping over her own tongue or stammering. It's an achievement and she's proud of herself. She's not even a little bit tipsy (one of the many tragedies of the apocalypse were the world's vineyards. Alex can no longer keep a bottle of wine on hand for any and all social situations and life is a more anxious place now indeed).
"Great," Maggie says. "I'll give you a buzz later." She smiles again.
God.
She's so perfect.
She must have absconded with teeth whitening strips and gum during the apocalypse in addition to toothpaste.
"I need to go back to DEO things," Alex says.
Maggie keeps smiling. "I understand. Secret government work. I'll leave you to it then."
Alex can hear her heart pounding in her ears. She swallows. She should say something else. She should!
Maggie gracefully fires up the motor on her patrol boat and sails off around the corner of a sunken skyscraper.
How did she manage to gracefully start a boat motor?
It was probably the leather jacket.
Leather jacket superpowers.
Alex should wear hers again.
Yes.
And then I'll have super powers too, the rational part of her mind says.
And then Maggie will like me more, says the totally irrational crazy lunatic part of her.
Alex fires up the motor of her patrol boat in a most un-graceful fashion (because she's not wearing a leather jacket) and turns back towards the DEO's base.
The trip back gives her too much time to think.
After things hadn't worked out – hadn't happened – with Maggie, and then with the chaos of the apocalypse, Alex hadn't thought much about dating. She'd been very busy saving lives and other various and sundry tasks. Alex hadn't even met any other women she thought she might be attracted to.
Extreme global warming doesn't leave much time for any sort of commitment to a Sapphic lifestyle. The conservatives finally found their answer to the gay agenda.
But now, Maggie. Here. Well. There. Over there. Now. In a fetching leather jacket.
Alex wipes a bit of sweat from her brow.
[] [] []
After the end of the world, the DEO provides dinner to the entire staff and all the agents every night. For a sixth string base, the hideout is incredibly well-stocked on rations.
Inspired by ancient Martian custom and in an effort to promote community, J'onn has decreed that everyone eat together and no one sneak off with their food except in cases of contagious disease.
The result is that DEO dinner is like Thanksgiving with the entire extended family every single night.
Everyone has created their own coping mechanism.
For Alex and Kara, it's to eat together at the far end of one of the tables.
"How was your day?" Alex asks.
Kara's forehead wrinkles and she reaches up to adjust glasses that she hasn't worn since Lena Luthor told her they made her look like a sexy librarian (Kryptonian blushes were dangerous things – Winn calculated that Kara singlehandedly contributed to half a glacier's worth of melt).
"They were fighting over a conch shell today," Kara says, her voice a mixture of disbelief, disappointment, and sadness. "I had to stop a riot. I-
"So how was Maggie?" Winn asks as he sits down next to Alex with his dinner of rehydrated foodstuffs. Mon-El sits down next to Kara. They're grinning like teenage boys. Which is to say, they are perfectly happy and wrapped up in being themselves.
Kara gives Alex a sharp look. "Maggie? She's alive?"
"Yes," Alex says, "I ran into her-
Mon-El cuts in. "You know, on Daxam, when two women decide to mate, it's considered very sexy. Men are willing to pay vast sums of money to watch."
Alex stares.
Kara stares.
Did Mon-El really just say that?
"As a lesbian," Alex starts.
"Supporter?" Winn asks.
Alex glares. "As a lesbian," she repeats.
"Supporter?" Mon-El chimes.
"As a lesbian," Alex repeats, very firmly.
"Supporter?" Winn and Mon-El chorus. They then share a look. And then they share a high-five.
Did Alex like them better when they were both pining over Kara? It's hard to remember.
Alex picks up her tray of rehydrated foodstuffs and stands. "I have a contagious disease," she announces. "Don't come looking for me."
As Alex walks out of the room, Mon-El turns to Winn. "She'll be in her bunk?"
Alex can hear Kara's irate scolding echo down the hallway as she continues her dramatic storming out.
Instead of to her bunk (where she never intended to go, thank you very much Mr. On Daxam), Alex finds herself headed towards the bay where they park their patrol ships. She finds the boat she was in that afternoon and climbs in. She sits down on the bench and proceeds to eat her dinner. She's a little bit angry and she chews with a little bit too much gusto and it's probably not good for her teeth – which is going to be a problem someday because, well, unlike Maggie, Alex did not prioritize toothpaste and whitening strips during the evacuation.
Alex is finishing up dinner when the radio in her boat goes live. "Alex? This is Maggie. Over."
Alex promptly drops the remains of her rehydrated tuna sandwich – damnit, that wouldn't have happened if she had leather jacket superpowers – as she reaches for the radio. "This is Alex. Over."
"Hey Alex," Maggie says. "I hadn't seen you since the apocalypse. How are you? Over."
The first answer that comes to Alex's mind is gay but she exercises admirable self-control and says, "I'm surviving. How are you? Over."
"The usual," Maggie says, then pauses – leaving unanswered the question what is 'the usual' in the aftermath of the apocalypse? – then continues, "How is your sister? Over."
"She spends most of her time on the islands," Alex answers. "She had to stop a riot over a conch shell today. Over."
"Who riots over a conch shell?" Maggie asks. "Ten year old boys? Anyway – are you free? There's something I want to show you. I'm over at Mt. Highsmith. Over."
The answer is obviously yes, but Alex doesn't reply immediately. She has to calculate how long it will take her to fetch her leather jacket. She stalls for time. "Is it a dead body? Over."
"No dead bodies," Maggie assures. "Unless my co-workers don't stop making crass jokes. Over."
"Ten-four, ten-seventy-six. Over," Alex answers. She immediately hops out of her boat and sprints for her bunk, nearly crashing headlong into Mon-El on the way.
"Oh, so you are headed for your bunk," the Daxamite says. "You know, on Daxam-
Alex doesn't care. She's already gone.
Once at her bunk, locating her leather jacket is easy. It's in her locker, untouched since the apocalypse.
There really, really aren't many cows left in the world. Despite being close relatives of dolphins, domestic cattle just aren't strong swimmers.
Leather jacket in hand, Alex heads back to the bay, gracefully fires up the motor on her patrol boat, and heads for Maggie's location.
It's not all that far.
It's really a wonder why the DEO hadn't known there was another group operating nearby with a substantially similar objective.
Alex considers flipping on the radio and asking Maggie a second time how it is she and her entire operation haven't made bigger waves on the post-apocalypse sea scene, but decides against it. She doesn't want to draw too much attention to the DEO's oversight. Instead, she radios, "It's getting dark. Can you put out a light for me? Over."
There's a lag before Maggie responds. "For you? Anything. Over."
Alex smiles, then catches herself smiling, then stops smiling, then remembers no one's around to see her, then goes back to smiling. In the distance, a white fluorescent beacon flickers to life. Alex adjusts her course and reaches for her radio. "You're not getting me into something shady, like a patrol boat drag race, are you? Over."
"I would never get you into anything you didn't ask for. Over."
It's a good thing Alex isn't a Kryptonian. Her blush would have finished off whatever's left of the glaciers.
As Alex approaches the mountaintop, she sees Maggie sitting outside on a large rocky outcrop. Maggie waves.
Alex waves back.
Alex narrowly avoids crashing her boat into the mountain because she is busy waving and hoping Maggie will smile her toothpaste-commercial-grade smile.
Alex hopes Maggie didn't notice.
Maggie looks surprised, so she did notice, but then she smiles, so: worth.
Alex brings her boat up near Maggie's rock and Maggie hops in.
Maggie is wearing her fetching leather jacket. Maggie is looking at Alex. Maggie is smiling.
Maybe she just noticed Alex's fetching leather jacket.
"Hi," says Alex.
"Hi," says Maggie.
Maggie puts her hand on top of Alex's on the steering wheel. "Let me drive?"
Alex swallows, nods, says nothing because her wits are very much not about her, then evacuates to the other end of the rather small boat. Nope, her wits aren't there either.
It's definitely dark now. The sea is getting rougher but the area where they are is relatively safe and, in the wake of the apocalypse, most everyone has gotten very good at sailing ships and swimming (except the cows). Maggie turns on the boat's headlight. "I don't think we parted ways on a great note last time," Maggie says, and it's clear she's not talking about her sailing off and leaving a giant dead tentacle alien behind.
Well. That's one way to put it.
"And I spent a lot of time thinking about it," Maggie continues.
The ocean waves slosh gently against their ship, preventing any true silence.
Belatedly, it occurs to Alex that she's now out at sea in a small boat on the precipice of a meaningful conversation with the most attractive woman she has met in her adult life and she hasn't gone through a briefing with Kara first, nor does she have her trusty wine bottle.
Trouble smells like not-so-salty-water and leather.
"That was a long time ago," Alex says. "Before the end of the world."
"It was," Maggie says. She guides their boat around a large rock. On the other side is a set of enormous geysers, enough of them erupting with enough frequency that it's almost constant. The noise makes Maggie have to shout. "And since it's now after the end of the world, I was hoping you'd give me another chance."
"You took us to see geysers?" Alex shouts back.
Maggie shrugs. "Do you remember when I took you to the alien bar the first time?"
Alex nods yes.
Maggie gestures to indicate their boat and then the geysers. "You, me, a ship, an exuberant water feature – I like overwrought and heavy handed metaphors."
"So do I," Alex yells. And she does. It's not the first time that she's observed that, between the leather jackets and the alien hunting and the kicking ass, she and Maggie are incredibly similar. Almost like they were made for each other.
"I don't remember any volcanoes in this area," Alex yells. "What's causing these geysers?"
"Ship from Warworld crashed here a while ago," Maggie shouts back. "Its core is slowly decaying and releasing massive radiation in bursts-
Alex finishes Maggie's sentence for her. "The water absorbs the radiation, but the energy causes the geyser effect. That can't be stable!"
A geyser blasts up about twenty meters from the boat, spraying them lightly with warm not-very-salty sea water. Maggie waits for it to subside before shouting, "We think the core might blow soon - could take a chunk of the planet with it."
"Sounds like a job for Supergirl," Alex shouts.
"My thoughts exactly," is Maggie's reply.
Neither of them move for the radio to call for help.
"So about that second chance?" Maggie shouts.
Very careful, making no sudden movements so as not to capsize their ship, Alex shuffles from her bench over to Maggie. "Kiss me," she shouts.
"What?" Maggie question-shouts back.
"Kiss me," Alex repeats, louder. "I kissed you last time. You kiss me."
Maggie leans over and kisses her.
It is a most excellent kiss.
In the background, a geyser erupts.
Alex and Maggie continue kissing.
Another geyser erupts, a lot closer.
The makeout continues.
A third geyser blows about five meters from their boat, drenching them and creating waves that threaten to capsize their small ship.
Maggie and Alex pull apart reluctantly.
"We should go now," Maggie says.
Alex nods and reaches for the radio. "I'll call Kara."