Because love just isn't enough sometimes, ok?!

Ever since Alex and Maggie had called off their own wedding due to one little (well, not little) disagreement, Kara's own hope and faith in the concept of love had been fading faster and faster with each passing day. Now here she sat, at Lena's house. They were on the couch together, watching a film. Or rather, there was a film on, but neither of them were paying attention to it. Lena had fallen asleep on Kara's shoulder and Kara, herself, felt a million miles away from it all. Instead, all she could think about was love, romance, disagreement, politics, conflict, identity... and failure. When Alex had been with Maggie, Kara's heart had been filled with hope and joy. Every day was a step closer to their wedding, to their "happily ever after", to them tying the knot and becoming partners for life. Every day was a step closer for Kara to the same path, with Lena...

After she lost Mon-El, Kara had been stuck between a very painful rock and hard place. Of course, on the most surface level, she was grieving because she missed Mon-El. Contrary to what anyone said or thought, she had genuinely loved him. Sure, he wasn't perfect, but no one was. But despite all of his issues, he was good, and kind, and funny. He really had been a good match and partner. And she missed him dearly.

But the other side of Kara's grief had come from a personal struggle she was dealing with. That struggle came in the form of the woman who was now sleeping so peacefully on her arm. Lena Luthor. From the very beginning, Kara had been a little bit in love with Lena Luthor, but fear had always, always, kept her from ever acting upon those feelings. Kara had loved Lena, but would a Luthor and a Super ever really work? Especially when the Luthor didn't even realize she was dating a Super? That had been one of Kara's bigger reserves against dating Lena. Theirs would not be a relationship built upon trust, but rather, it would be built upon deceit and secrecy. And Kara didn't need to be a human to know that relationships like that would always fail in the end. At least Kara's relationship with Mon-El had been honest. He had known Kara's deepest and most precious secret. Lena still didn't. And Kara hated that. She hated that she had never told Lena. Could she really call her relationship with Lena a good one if 50% of her life was a secret from Lena? But it wasn't only the big secret that had, initially, driven Kara away from Lena.

The next reason Kara had, initially, been against the idea of dating Lena was because of something far more personal. Lena could never truly understand Kara's life, story, or struggle. Try as she may, Lena would never truly get Kara. Although both of them had been adopted, forced to relocate to a whole new world after the loss of a beloved planet, the difference between Lena's story and Kara's was so vast that sheer adoption alone was not enough to bind them. At least Lena had been able to stay on one planet through the course of her adoption. At least Lena hadn't had to watch her entire world go up in flames while she was sent away. At least Lena was still with her own kind. Kara couldn't say the same.

And this was part of the reason why Kara had, initially, chosen Mon-El over Lena. Maybe the Daxomites and Kryptonians were enemies, but at least Mon-El understood the things Kara had to go through on a daily basis as an alien refugee disguised as a human. Lena would never understand that, and that was why Kara had chosen Mon-El first. There would always be something between her and Mon-El that Lena would never have. For all the kinks in their romance, at least Mon-El knew what it felt like to lose a whole planet and have to hide in a new one. At least Lena hadn't ever been forced to evacuate a whole planet, or come to a whole new world that didn't understand her, and then spend every day of that new life in secrecy. Maybe Lena was a pariah, but at least she was still human. There were no laws illegalizing Luthors. She didn't have to hide.

And that had been the third and most important reason why Kara had been opposed to the idea of courting Lena. Lena was, plain and simple, anti-alien. Kara got a firsthand taste of that with Lena's little alien-detector. Even though Lena had built the device with good intentions, the sentiment behind the device was still very anti-alien. The moment Lena had explained to Kara that the device was meant to, "be placed in stores all across America" so that the shop-owners could tell, "who among them was not really one of them", Kara knew that a relationship between her and Lena would never ever truly work or last. Could she really overlook such a glaring problem with Lena's worldview? Could she really, in good faith, heart and logic, court someone who stood against her very existence? Perhaps Lena meant no harm in her views, but the truth of the matter was, she was still anti-alien, and by being anti-alien, she was anti-Kara. No matter how good or mellow her views were, at the end of the day, they were still something Kara literally could not reconcile with.

Additionally, as Kara now noted with very dark amusement, for one who claimed to value secrets and secrecy, Lena certainly had no issue in trying to sniff out aliens among her ranks. Kara thanked God and Rao both that Lena had somehow failed to catch her yet. Who knew what Lena would do if she ever found out what Kara really was? And that was the real reason Kara never told Lena the truth about her identity. It had very little to do with the fact that Lena was a Luthor. Kara's real problem had been Lena's anti-alien views. After all, Kara had heard Lena, out loud, say that alien citizens were not truly human citizens. How could Kara possibly come out to a woman like that about her true identity? Answer: she couldn't. So from that very first day, Kara had hidden, vowing never to tell Lena the truth, for fear of what Lena might do to her if she ever did find out. It wouldn't have been the first time Kara had lost a friend because they couldn't tolerate the idea of her alien identity. She didn't want the same thing to happen with Lena, so she hid, and she lied.

So, in short, part of the reason Kara had never dated Lena was because of their conflicting opinions about aliens. Kara was able to overlook Lena's beliefs in most cases, but could she really enter a partnership with a woman who was against the very core of who she was? Could Kara really date a woman who had the goal of allowing all humans on Earth to know who among them was only an alien in disguise? Kara was in that minority, and Lena had taken a firm stance against it. Could Kara really compromise that much of her identity just to make a relationship with Lena work? That was why Kara had chosen Mon-El, because even if the Daxomites and Kryptonians were enemies, at least they were both aliens and, thusly, understood each other on that basic level when left standing alone on Earth. It was something Lena could never understand as a human.

But even so, Kara had always loved Lena. Before, during and after her romance with Mon-El, Kara had loved Lena. When Kara looked past Lena's human-ness, and her moderately anti-alien views, Kara saw the most beautiful soul any planet could've ever created. She saw a woman who laughed and loved. Even if she hid it behind a cold and professional mask, Lena's heart was warm and real. Kara adored it. And she saw a woman who constantly strove for justice and goodness. When Kara looked at Lena, even while she was with Mon-El, Kara saw someone she wanted to spend the rest of her life with. She saw someone who shared a lot of the same values she did, even if their beliefs differed. They were both so fixated on justice, and it was one of the many things Kara had adored about Lena. But that still brought up another problem. Kara did not doubt that Lena would always fight for what was right. What Kara doubted was what Lena considered right. The problem was not if Lena would choose the side of good, the problem was what Lena considered good. It was the one thing Kara could never really look past.

But ok. Kara would confess. She did finally, eventually, hook up with Lena. After Mon-El had gone, although it destroyed Kara, because Lena had always been a presence in the back of her mind, a crueler side of her grief convinced her to take her chance with Lena now that Mon-El was out of the way. It was a horrible thing to think, but Kara's loneliness following the loss of Mon-El was powerful enough that Kara decided to obey that selfish voice in her head and move on. She obeyed her selfish side and sought out a new companion. She finally took the leap she had been too afraid to in the past. Even though Mon-El hadn't been gone that long, Kara finally pursued a relationship with Lena. But Kara could still remember it with hideous clarity. Their first kiss...

When Kara and Lena finally made their romance official, even sealing it with a kiss, Kara had felt as though she was in paradise. Lena's lips had been so incredibly soft and warm against her own, and Kara could practically taste the beautiful and glowing future that awaited the two of them now that they were finally together. It had been a wonderful, divine moment that would last a lifetime in Kara's memory. Kissing Lena was like, cliché as it sounded, finding everything she had ever wanted in life. The hole in her chest where Mon-El had been was filled back up and even overflowed. But that was just it. Even when Kara was kissing Lena, Mon-El was still in the back of her mind.

In fact, when Kara finally pulled away from kissing Lena, she could've sworn she'd seen Mon-El, standing in the shadows and watching them. But since it was only a ghost of a memory, Kara had not been able to see his face to understand how he felt about Kara getting together with Lena, but she could wonder. Was he disapproving? Angry? Sad? Hurt? Jealous? Because Kara really had shared something special and beautiful and powerful with Mon-El, something unique that not even Lena could ever share with Kara. But Lena had had something that Mon-El hadn't either, so they were well-matched in Kara's eyes. Both of them held a special part of her, but how could she choose?

Kara had chosen Mon-El at first, and she hadn't had any regrets, but Lena had always been in the back of her mind as she dated Mon-El. And then, after Kara finally started that long-awaited relationship with Lena, it was Mon-El's turn to haunt her. He was an everlasting storm cloud over her head, a burning reminder of her indecisive and selfish desire to have a lover. It was like a vicious cycle. If Kara was with Mon-El, she was doomed to fantasize about a life with Lena. If she was with Lena, she was doomed to fantasize about a life with Mon-El. And this indecisiveness scared Kara deeply. It scared her to think that the only reason she'd finally made a move on Lena was because, with Mon-El gone, it was either Lena or loneliness, and Kara had been too cowardly to face the latter option. It scared her to think that Mon-El would consider Kara's quick recovery into Lena's arms as a form of infidelity. It scared Kara to think that her love for Lena was not as pure as she thought it was. It scared Kara to think that by starting a romance with Lena, she was jumping on a ship that was already sinking.

But even after Kara managed to put Mon-El behind her long enough to convince herself that this relationship with Lena was ok and justified, her life with Lena still hadn't been what she thought it might've been. Kara was quick to learn that no romance was perfect, and all relationships were less than what one of the lovers may have envisioned. And that really went back to Kara's original and strongest reserve against dating Lena. Their colliding political views. Although Kara was more than willing to sacrifice some of them in order to keep Lena close, there was only so much Kara could give before even she reached a breaking point. How much of her identity did she have to sacrifice to make this work? How much could she sacrifice before she became someone who wasn't even Kara Danvers at all? Could Kara really allow Lena's anti-alien views to slide if an alien identity was so salient for Kara? Maybe a Luthor and a Super really were bound to fail. Not because of any bad blood between bloodlines, but just because their political and world views were irreconcilably different. A Super could never truly be anti-alien so long as she, herself, was alien, and would a Luthor really ever change her mind or step down from the things she believed it? Would it be fair to ask her to?

Kara's mind then flickered over to Samantha Arias, who was a Kryptonian like herself. Lena was friendly enough with Sam, even though Sam turned out to be a part-time, mass-murdering alien, but that was just it! Lena was friendly with Sam's human side, but the alien side? She had wanted to eradicate it. Of course, in this case, that desire was understandable, but what did it mean for the rest of alien-kind? Would Lena only love and trust them if, like Sam, they were willing to have their alien side stripped away? Because God and Rao both knew Lena wasn't exactly on friendly terms with Supergirl at the moment. Was it because she was an alien? No, Kara knew why...

Kara had been quite unfair to Lena of late, but this was because there were some thing Kara just couldn't back down from. Kara still loved Lena dearly, but rifts were starting to form in their relationship. Kara was slowly but surely reaching her breaking point. And so was Lena. And all the while, Kara still had to contend with the fact that she wasn't being totally honest with Lena about her identity. But could Kara trust her with it? Not because she was a Luthor, but because she was an anti-alien human. What would Lena do to Kara if she knew Kara wasn't a human like her?

It wasn't the 'Luthor' part of Lena that Kara hated. It was the human part. As long as Lena was a human, she wouldn't truly understand the struggle of an alien. It was why Kara had, initially, seen herself better suited with Mon-El, because he had understood a side of her Lena never could, even if she wanted to. But even so, Kara had loved Lena deeply. But it wouldn't be fair to ask Kara to totally forgive Lena's politics for love, because Kara was more than just a lover, but it wouldn't be fair of her to demand that Lena change either. Oh, it was all just so confusing!

And that was when Maggie and Alex's failed relationship began to take hold in Kara's mind. Alex and Maggie, two people so madly in love. So perfectly and beautifully in love. Practically designed for one another to be together as partners, equals, lovers. Two people so right for each other and so happy together. So in love. And yet it all still fell apart. An irreconcilable difference. Something seemingly small that became big, large enough to swallow the couple whole and spit them back out miles and miles apart. Something they couldn't compromise on without sacrificing too much of their individual desires.

Because that was the thing. A couple was not a couple. It was still two individuals who came together upon agreement. But if agreement was what brought them together, disagreement could push them apart again. And this time, it did. The disagreement was so big, so demanding, that neither Alex nor Maggie wished to sacrifice their own individual desires. It would've gone one way or another, it was something that couldn't be fairly split in half. It had to go one way or the other, and one person would be left totally unhappy because of that type of result. There was no real way to compromise, it was a pure win-lose situation, and no good couple would want something like that. If one person sacrificed too much, they would no longer be the person they used to be when they first entered in this partnership.

So Alex and Maggie had called it quits. Painful as it was, both decided that, in this case, their own personal health was worth more than the health of their relationship, and they allowed their bonds to fray into brokenness in order to preserve the individuals that they were. It was a very brave thing to do, Kara agreed, and both Maggie and Alex deserved to be happy in the long run, but that didn't make their breakup any easier for anyone. And now, as Kara sat here, Lena sleeping so peacefully on her shoulder, she couldn't help but see the parallels between these two relationships. Alex and Maggie had been Kara's idealized goal for herself and Lena. Alex and Maggie had given Kara hope that two different people could set aside their differences to make love work.

Then Alex and Maggie fell apart. Their differences and their right to those differences finally got between the love that they shared and Kara, with a sinking stomach, wondered if she and Lena would someday reach the same path. Maybe right now, everything was pretty good, but even now, evidences of irreconcilable differences were cropping up here and there in their relationship and Kara only worried that, one day, in the near or far future, they would wind up in Alex and Maggie's shoes. The question was not 'if'. It was 'when'.

Maybe today, Kara and Lena were happy. But what about tomorrow? And Kara began to wonder about whether or not she ought to break things off with Lena after all. It would be easier in the long run to cut things off before they really had time to bloom, but Kara didn't want to ruin what might be a happily ever after just because she was worried. But did she want to wait until they did reach an inevitable downward spiral? Even though a life with Lena was all Kara really wanted, she began to realize that it was a life with an idealized Lena. An alien-understanding Lena. One that simply did not exist. Life with Lena was like a dream to Kara: beautiful, but unrealistic, and it would have to come to an end eventually. The blond was suddenly reminded of the Black Mercy, and she smiled darkly. Her Black Mercy would be a life with Lena, she knew that without a doubt, but Black Mercies were liars. They were illusions to be turned away from, Alex had taught her that. Ah, good old Alex, always teaching her the harsh realities of life. First, she'd been forced to wake up from the Black Mercy. Now, she was being forced to wake up from her idealized version of Lena, before she mistook it for the real one sitting beside her now. This was the real Lena, and this was the one that simply could not function in a relationship with someone like Kara Danvers.

Finally, Kara got up. Lena was still asleep on her arm, but Kara had never felt so far away from the Luthor than now. She still didn't know whether or not she would break up with Lena, but she did know that she couldn't stay here any longer tonight. Without a sound, she turned off the TV, removing the movie from its DVD player and putting it back in its little cover before returning it to Lena's movie shelf. Then she carried Lena to her bed and tucked the sleeping woman in between the sheets. Kara did not give her a goodnight kiss. Instead, once she'd wrapped Lena up in her blankets, Kara took leave of the house altogether, but she wasn't headed back to her own home either. Instead, she flew right out of the city entirely until she was standing alone under the stars in a very flat, isolated area on the outskirts of the city. It was there that she finally began to cry, sobbing and screaming in frustration and despair. Only the moonlit heavens could hear her. But she could hear far more than just herself.

As Kara despaired, she could hear Maggie's guilty and agonized whimpers as she called off the engagement. She could hear her strong and proud sister, sounding utterly crushed and broken. It was the most haunting thing Kara had ever heard. And then Kara could hear Lena, her laughter and her words of love, intermingled with an icy disposition about right and wrong... Kara could also hear Mon-El, telling her that he understood her, and he really meant this, and she knew he was right. His laughter, his teasing, his goading her into bickering, his confused feelings regarding his family and his home world, which he had left entirely behind himself. Then Kara could hear herself. She could hear herself, professing love to Mon-El and Lena both. She could hear her selfish inner voice commanding her to fall in love with Lena and keep her as close as possible, no matter what it would do to anyone else.

And, through her tears, Kara thought she could see her Black Mercy vision. A wedding. She could see herself in a dress, walked down a long silver aisle with J'onn leading her to the altar where a suit-clad Lena waited for her, smiling. She could see Alex, Maggie, Sam, Ruby, Winn, James, all of them. Standing around the chapel, but Kara only had eyes for the woman waiting for her at the altar. She didn't even see the priest behind Lena, waiting for them to say their vows. Organ music, laughter, tears, rings, promises, whispers and kisses.

Then, as Kara stood right in front of Lena to look into her eyes, things melted away. She could see Alex and Maggie transposing over herself and Lena. Smiles turned to agony and Alex and Maggie flickered back and forth into Lena and Kara. She could hear strains of sobbing and fighting as an ever-lasting difference arose. Talk of children, descendants, mixed with politics began to smother the chapel air. She could hear Alex screaming and Maggie crying.

Next, the voices changed to her own and Lena's. Only this time, the fight was about aliens. And Supergirl. She could see visions of the past when they had been able to set aside their differences, but those visions faded and were replaced with a far clearer, crueler sight. This time, these differences were not so easily ignored or compromised. Children. Aliens. The wedding bells became death tolls. Then suddenly, the wedding dress was gone and Kara was only in her work uniform again. Lena was still in a suit, but this time, it was not a wedding tux, it was a business suit. She was off to another conference about mass-producing and selling alien-outing devices. Then the chapel was gone.

And now Kara was alone in the night again, whimpering miserably in defeat. Kara really did love Lena, more than anything in the world. And a life with Lena really was Kara's ultimate dream, but only in the way a Black Mercy was an ultimate dream. Kara would have to wake up one day, and Alex had been her first wakeup call.

Kara was seriously considering about breaking up with Lena now, even though Lena had been all that she had wanted for so long. There was just too much between them for a healthy romance to bloom. It would bud, but then it would die. It would not bloom, and Kara knew it. She was riding a dead-end road, and it would be better to stop and U-turn now than wait until they reached the end.

Love was not enough to save Alex and Maggie. Love was not enough to save Kara and Mon-El. Love would not be enough to save Kara and Lena. It was an agonizing lesson, but one Kara could no longer close her eyes to. Not when she could still see Alex and Maggie's unworn wedding bands glittering in her memory. Kara loved Lena, but love was not enough.

AN: Just a random and depressing one-shot that's meant to be some musing about Kara's romantic relationships and a darker twist on the fate of SuperCorp. SuperCorp is canon in this fic, but it's not the idealized power couple we like to imagine it as. Instead, it's a flawed and failing relationship whose foundation was never ever that strong, even from the start. Kara begins to see this, and how different she and Lena really are, and she worries that, like with Maggie and Alex, they will finally reach some sort of impasse where compromise is no longer possible.

I don't ship Karamel, but I like to think that there was a real reason Kara hooked up with him beyond lazy CW writing and I like the idea that Kara was always torn between Mon-El and Lena because she saw two beautiful and powerful halves of herself within each of them and she could never truly decide which mattered more to her (I know polyamory is a thing, but let's assume that, in this case, Kara rejects the idea because she can't see herself more than one partner, or she can't see Lena ever wanting to be intimate with Mon-El).

Consider it mostly me being broody because of how unpromising S4 is looking in regard to Lena's character. And I was just musing on the failed Sanvers thing (I feel like I'm going to wind up as Maggie because I really don't want kids, but I know a lot of people out here still do) because I really don't like the "love is enough" quote. It's really not. If it were, Sanvers would've been endgame.

And I may have never had a romantic relationship before, but I've lost friends over political disagreements because I don't think you can always just set aside what you believe in for the sake of being able to get along. Call me cynical, but that's just my thoughts on issues like these. Where's the line between compromise and getting to take a stand, even if it causes some tension?