Note: I have a lot of feelings about Ace Reporter, especially the Couch Scene and Lena's fears of becoming like her mother. Also I am eternally devoted to projecting all of my personal psychiatric issues and past abuse onto Lena Luthor, Closeted Lesbian. Also also, I'm sick and tired of people using "he went insane!" as an easy catchall (ableist, nonsensical) excuse for Lex murdering a bunch of people. I wanna see mental illness and negative emotions depicted in an honest, non-stigmatized, morally neutral way! I wanna see morally corrupt, abusive people held accountable without ableism being leveraged to explain away their intentionally harmful behavior! So this is the result of all of that. Sorry in advance, and I hope you enjoy.
Warning for explicit description of emotional child abuse, internalized homophobia, ableist language, mental illness (specifically: psychosis, depression, bipolar disorder, PTSD, personality disorders).
Lena remembers her father's psychotic episodes. He used to take time off work when they happened, hole up in his home office, and spend most of the day behind forbiddingly closed doors. Lex and her would tend to be quietly agitated, irritable, jumpy, as if some comforting order had been disrupted. Lena supposes it had been.
Lionel would always join them for dinner, however. He'd be fidgety and quiet and distracted, answering questions oddly and avoiding eye contact. But he'd smile at them, occasionally, his eyes on Lex's chin or the top of Lena's head, and his smiles would feel genuine, immensely reassuring somehow.
Lena remembers feeling impotent anger at Lillian's disapproving pursed lips, her correcting touches that seemed intrusive to Lena.
Or maybe she was just projecting.
.
Lena remembers her mother's episodes, too. Only they weren't psychotic. As she liked to remind her often, Lillian was perfectly mentally stable. Her episodes weren't erratic, strange, unprompted; in fact, they seemed quite the opposite. Calculated, considered, almost timed, like a windup clock that's reached its last turn, burnt through its mechanical energy and needed to be rewound. Somehow, it always seemed to happen exactly when Lena was least emotionally prepared, most off guard. And the rewinding process, rather than simple elbow grease, required complete obedience, supplication, and fear.
Lillian wouldn't hole up in her lab, during those times; she'd seek Lena out instead. It'd start with a smile, an ostensibly innocent question, and end, without fail, in a lecture and a punishment, Lena fighting tears, disoriented and bewildered, no matter how many times it happened, and happened, and happened.
.
Lena was diagnosed with the wonderful, all-encompassing, functionally useless Cluster B Personality Disorder when she was twelve. The proposed treatment: CBT and low dose antidepressants and learn to cultivate better, hopefully less visible and disruptive coping mechanisms, Lena, please.
At fourteen bipolar disorder and CPTSD were tentatively proposed and by fifteen, having had her most visible and disruptive manic episode yet, she was on antipsychotics as well.
Things got markedly better after that. It wasn't that Lena felt any safer at home, or any less alienated from her peers, and Lillian certainly didn't miraculously become warm and understanding and reasonable overnight. But Lena's head was finally starting to make sense to her; she felt much steadier and more confident within herself, more in control, and she couldn't be unbalanced as easily.
The fact that her outward conduct and mannerisms became more subdued and controllable also meant less negative attention. She had reached a truce with her own brain; she had science; she had Lex. All in all, it was absolutely worth the extra ammunition Lillian got out of intermittently, with her usual surgical precision, rubbing her face in her own diagnoses.
.
"Every woman becomes their mother." If Lena had a penny for every time she heard this phrase… she'd still be a millionaire. Every abuse survivor turns into their abuser, that's another one. Every Luthor turns crazy.
She already is, though. She used to comfort herself just like this: she's already crazy, she's been crazy since she was twelve, and she isn't her mother. She isn't her mother. Yet.
"Why do you think you're destined to become your mother?" a therapist asked her, once. "Wouldn't it be more logical for you, someone who knows firsthand how painful and damaging her behavior can be, to try even harder to adopt an opposite behavior model?"
It is more logical, yes. And on her good days, Lena believes it, wholeheartedly, fiercely, unwaveringly. She's a Luthor, but she's her own kind of Luthor. The kind of Luthor who benefits the world, who cares about others, who doesn't fucking abuse children.
But then there are the not-as-good days, the not-good-at-all days, the absolutely-wretchedly-horrible days.
The day Jack dies—scratch that, the day Lena kills Jack—that's an absolutely-wretchedly-horrible day.
.
Lena had been in various levels of the proverbial closet throughout most of her adult life (and all of her adolescence, obviously). The idea of being able to want a woman, let alone be with one, hold her, kiss her, fuck her, love her, was simply unimaginable to Lena.
It wasn't that Lillian was unusually homophobic. Just the typical, average amount, if Lena had to try and quantify it. It was more like, Lillian wasn't interested in Lena's fulfillment as a person; she'd never considered the idea of Lena having a strong opinion about her own identity, and if Lena had to guess, she'd say Lillian would expect that if Lena had the audacity to have such an unnecessary opinion, at the very least it should be the most common, least obtrusive one.
And for many, many, many years, Lena thought exactly the same.
So she'd have bad, draining, apathetic sex with men, she'd feel like shit before, during, and after, and then they'd never call her back, and she'd be simultaneously disappointed and relieved. She'd feel unsatisfied and unsatisfying, tired and inexplicable and wanting and unwanted.
And then there was Jack. Finding him felt like a light had been switched on inside of her. Spending time with him was fun; she didn't have to force herself to laugh at his jokes; when she spoke about things she cared about, he seemed to genuinely enjoy listening to her.
And after they'd had bad, draining, apathetic sex, he had called back. And Lena wasn't disappointed at all.
Jack wanted her, enjoyed her company, liked her as a person; they'd had years of friendship and easy collaboration as proof of that. And Lena felt safe with him, felt cared for and intellectually engaged and… happy.
It felt—and thinking about this now makes her cringe like no tomorrow—it felt to her like spending time with Lex, back when they still loved each other, except there was some kissing involved.
And, thinking about it in retrospect, maybe if Lena'd actually had any healthy, fulfilling relationships of any kind, whether familial or friendly or romantic, she'd have had an easier time realizing that she was a big, huge, enormous fucking lesbian.
But as it was, she'd only had Jack, and Lex, and half-distorted memories of Lionel and terrible, strictly sexual straight flings, and so she didn't realize that, not for a while. Not until she was in National City, out of the radius of her mother's reach (as far as she'd known at the time, ha), freshly broken up with one of the few people she'd ever loved, and allowing herself to look for a fresh start.
It was a simultaneously hopeful and mournful time, and Lena doesn't think she'd have had the courage and determination to love and trust herself—and eventually, love and trust Kara—the way she had, if it weren't for Jack Spheer.
.
It takes her a few seconds to make the choice, actionably. Emotionally, however, she'd already hit the button in her mind as soon as the choice presented itself. Jack or Kara, bam, pressed. Jack or Kara, it was never even a contest.
So she kills Jack. She kills Jack, to save Supergirl, who is Kara, who is the woman she loves. She kills Jack. It's selfish but also the right thing to do but also unimaginably painful and still immeasurably less painful than the alternative.
She kills Jack, and now he is dead, and Kara really is the only person, the only thing she has left to hold onto in the world. All the friends she has now, every single person left in the world who gives a shit about her, they're all because of Kara. And if she loses that, she'll have nothing.
She kills Jack, and Kara promises to always protect her, but what if she can't? What if Lena stops being worthy of protection? What if it's Kara who needs protecting, and Lena isn't up to the challenge? What if the one Kara needs protection from is… is Lena herself?
She kills Jack, and the grief at his loss, the resentment at being forced into the position of being the one to make the choice, the enduring rage at Beth fucking Breen for taking something so important away from her, the perverse sense of triumph at her defeat—they threaten to swallow her whole, and she's terrified of what she'll become once she's been spat back out.
She kills Jack, and for all that she analyzes it and examines and deconstructs and rethinks it, she always ends up with the same conclusion: that's exactly what her mother would do.
.
"I don't think that's true," James tells her, in that quiet and calm voice of his, and she resents his certainty even as she's grateful for it. "From what I know of her, and everything you've told me, I'm pretty sure she would have just grabbed the Biomax controller and used it to her own ends."
Lena shakes her head. "It's too risky," she counters. "My mother prefers psychological control. Much safer. A physical controller like that could easily be knocked off her person, just like I did to Beth, and then she'd be at a major disadvantage. Better to destroy the specimen and move on."
James tilts his head in acknowledgement. "Even if that's true, your motives would still be wildly different."
"I protected my own self interest," Lena mutters. "How different is that, really?"
James bends down to look her in the eye, and she feels briefly annoyed at being treated like a child, then unexpectedly emotional at seeing the determined, caring look in his eyes. "You're angry, aren't you?" he asks her. "And that scares you? You feel unjustified, guilty? Like it makes you dangerous somehow?"
She swallows. His words are like a punch in the gut. She nods silently.
"Yeah." He chuckles humorlessly. "That's not evil, Lena. That's just what happens when you're conditioned to discount your own humanity. We have that in common."
She chews over his words for several moments, her eyes already stinging, and James just stands with her, silently supportive. As if he's giving her permission to—to feel.
Impulsively, she hugs him right then and there. And she'd have been immediately mortified, except he hugs back; and for all his height and bulk, it's one of the kindest, gentlest, most comfortable hugs Lena's experienced, rivaled only by Kara's.
.
"Feelings don't equal behavior," was a favorite phrase of one of her therapists. Thinking back, Lena liked her most out of all of them, though at the time she'd greatly frustrated her.
Because Lena remembers her mom telling her: "I wish you wouldn't purposely provoke me so much, Lena. You always know just how to push my buttons."
Lex telling her, before: "You shouldn't antagonize them. They find you threatening, so they lash out. I just want you to make it through boarding school, kid."
Lex telling her, after: "You don't understand how that feels, to be powerless, insignificant, lesser! Do you think I want to do this, Lena? Goddammit, I have to!"
"Feelings don't equal behavior." Well. That certainly hadn't been her experience.
Everyone always seemed to want to explain to her how they felt, when they hurt her or left her or broke her heart. And she had no choice but to take them at their word, really. After all, if it wasn't what they were feeling that compelled them to act that way, it must have been the one other common denominator: Lena.
.
"I just wanna state for the record that this wasn't my ideal choice," Alex says briskly as she leads Lena down some oddly designed DEO hallways. "But honestly you've been moping and so Kara's been moping and it's breaking my heart and I don't like it, so." She shrugs. Lena can't help smiling.
She remembers when Lex was gruff and grumpy and caring like this, too.
They arrive at a tiny control room with a big wall of monitors and not much else. Alex inputs some commands into one of the clunky controls and a screen in the middle switches its image.
Lena lets out a little gasp. That's definitely Kara in her Supergirl uniform.
Alex glares pointedly at Lena, then seems to soften. "This is footage of Kara—uh—confronting a hologram of her mom. Kryptonian mom, I mean." At Lena's look, she adds, "This is completely with Kara's permission and encouragement, don't worry. She'd have shown you herself, but it's obviously a very painful memory for her, and also she worries she's being too pushy."
"She isn't," Lena confides. "She's been giving me all the space I need. I wish she'd be a little less accommodating, if I'm honest."
"Uh-puh-puh, no thanks, I'm not getting in the middle of this one," Alex says, waving a dismissive hand. "You should tell her yourself. Right now, just watch the video, okay?"
So Lena watches. She watches as Kara bursts into the room, shouts down the hologram, uses her heat vision to destroy it and breaks down in tears in Alex's arms. She watches, feeling Kara's devastating grief and fury and resentment like a physical presence in her own body.
Once the short clip is done, Alex turns to her. Her visibly pained and emotionally drained expression must be mirrored in Lena's face, because Alex shoots her a small, uncharacteristic smile.
"Uh, yeah. So, as you can see, my little sister, who is objectively the best person in the universe—she's dealt with anger too," Alex says. "It was dangerous, yes, and a little destructive, and heartbreaking to watch, but. It's just part of who she is. And confronting that, allowing herself to feel it, accept it, and heal from it… it's only made her a better hero."
Lena feels like she wants to sit down. Or better yet, curl up in ball, preferably wrapped tight in Kara's arms, and let her head fill with white noise the way it does sometimes.
She leans against the monitor controls instead, swallowing against the lump in her throat.
Alex shuffles in place a little in front of her. "Anyway, in conclusion, anyone is allowed to be unreasonable sometimes. Do, uh, do you want me to comfort you now?"
Lena sniffles and lets out a laugh. "Thank you, Alex. It's okay. Just give me a minute."
Alex sighs and shakes her head. "Oh, come here already, Luthor."
And Lena really shouldn't rate Kara's family's hugs on a numerical scale, but she can't help noting that Alex's is hard and aggressive, short but powerful. She'd give it about a 9.3 out of 10, just as soon as she can stop crying.
.
Lena remembers when her brother began to toe off the precipice. Contrary to popular belief, it wasn't an uncontrolled, mad dash off the edge; it was a very deliberate, well-crafted execution of his ambitions and ideals.
Everyone always says people like that are "insane". Violent offenders, murderers, terrorists… That's what Lex was, of course, all three. But he wasn't "insane". It wasn't about his brain chemistry; it was about his mindset. And he had always had this mindset: that what he wanted, he could get. That he should, must be able to.
When they had been younger, it was charming. 'Look at that Golden Boy! He's a real go-getter!' people would say. And he really was. Ambition had always looked good on Lex. He was brilliant, confident, charismatic, and a very hard worker. And in any case, a bit of entitlement is taken for granted in any powerful young man. Only then, it had become more than 'a bit'.
Lena remembers their first few arguments. She'd been so passionate, thorough, preparing her talking points in advance, sure that if she'd just explain herself cohesively enough, Lex would understand. He was her brother; she loved him so much; they shared the deep, complex, steel-edged bond of two siblings surviving a shitty home life together. They protected each other, teased each other, prodded each other until they couldn't stand one another and then hugged it out.
And at the beginning, her long, practiced speeches seemed to work. Lex seemed to agree. He'd concede her point, apologize, they'd stop fighting and do something fun together.
But then, the next time she'd see him, he'd have developed a new counterpoint to the lynchpin of her previous argument, and their truces would become more and more lukewarm each time, their disagreements more and more heated and vicious. They matched each other perfectly in their stubbornness, their unshakable belief that each of their perspectives was the right one, the just one, the humane one.
In the end, it was Lex's certainty in himself and his values that made him who he was. And how could Lena honestly say for certain that she wasn't exactly the same?
(She can't. Perhaps nobody can. But maybe she can keep trying, and learning, and making mistakes, and growing from them. And maybe… maybe that's just good enough.)
.
Lena doesn't even get the chance to knock on the door before Kara shoves it open, sweeping Lena into the single best hug anyone has ever received in the history of the multiverse. 100 out of 10, of course. Every time. No competiton.
"Thanks for recruiting all your friends to try and convince me I'm not evil," Lena tells her once they're settled in their usual position on Kara's couch, Kara's arm around Lena's shoulder and Lena tucked into her side.
"I didn't recruit anyone," Kara protests softly. "They all love you. They are your friends, too, and they see you, just like I do, and they know that all the negative emotions in the world don't make somebody as sincere and honest and committed and thoughtful as you evil."
Lena has been peppering light lipsticky kisses all over the side of Kara's face, and Kara takes a break in her lecture to tilt her head and still a little kiss of her own, then dives right back in.
"It's natural to have unkind thought, to act selfishly sometimes, Lena, you work so hard every day to become a better person, to make some positive changes in the world. You hold yourself accountable, you're open to criticism, you try to see things from others' perspective. I wish you could see yourself the way I do. Then you'd have faith in you, too."
"All right, sweetie, I get the message," Lena teases, nipping at the underside of Kara's jaw between sentences. "You can stop with the lecture now."
Kara giggles and swats affectionately at her. "It's not a lecture, it's a pep talk! A pep talk!"
"Mmm," Lena murmurs, mouthing along the side of Kara's neck.
Kara keeps laughing, wrapping both her legs over Lena's torso and crossing them at the shin behind her back. Lena settles more fully on top Kara, enjoying the feeling of being bundled up within her, as much of their bodies pressed together as possible in this position.
"Kara… I want you to promise me something," Lena says, laying down her cheek on Kara's chest, listening for her slow and steady heartbeat. "Put protecting me aside for a moment. I want you promise me, always, no matter what, that you would hold me accountable. Even if you don't care about me anymore. Especially if I don't want you to. I need to know you would do that for me."
Kara unwinds from around her, draws Lena up in her lap, looks directly in her eyes; all traces of giggling gone, solemn and sincere. "I promise," she says.
Lena leans forward to press a quick, soft kiss to Kara's lips. She feels relieved, and hopeful, and sad, and still angry; but she thinks, maybe if she keeps trying, keeps loving, keeps living, she can be the person she wants to be.
And if she forgets, she knows she will have someone to remind her.