So, as I have more or less up to this point, I've been essentially lifting a lot of dialogue straight from the show. This chapter, that starts to diverge a bit and there are a couple of times when I switch who says what between Kara and Barry, largely because Lena blatantly flusters Kara way more than that other guy does, so… Anyway, I hope you enjoy it!

Also, side note, writing movie musicals in prose is weird.


Chapter Three

Lena!

Lena and Iris-

No, it's not-

Lena-!

Kara felt sure for a moment that she was having a very confusing heart attack.

Iris- no, Millie!- and Lena sat up quickly, lipstick smeared around their lips, and glared at the intruders.

Kara could feel her stomach writhing at the sight of Lena's possessive and protective hand still high on Iris's thigh.

"What the hell is going on?" Barry demanded. Kara was still reeling way too much for words.

This was not helped by the tiger-like smirk that spread slowly on Lena's face, that eyebrow of hers doing that thing where it rose imperiously and made Kara's insides do strange fluttery dances.

Nope!

"All right, you caught us," Iris said, her accent strange like Winn's had been.

"We're in love," Lena drawled, that irresistible pride and strength in her voice tempered with a soft, adoring look that she sent to Iris.

Kara thought she might throw up.

She could feel Barry's stare move from Iris and Lena to her for a few seconds but could not begin to think about answering the question she knew was in his mind.

This would have been so much simpler if it was Mon-El.

And gross for an entirely different set of reasons. Ugh.

"Hey, who are you?" Lena demanded, standing up and somehow managing to look down at them despite the fact that she was shorter than either of them. "Your names, now."

"I'm K-Kara," she somehow managed to choke out.

"Yeah, and I'm Barry," Barry said, hesitation in his voice; Kara could feel his eyes lingering on her questioningly but she couldn't look at him. "We're singers at your dad's nightclub," he finished, addressing Lena before turning to Iris. Kara wasn't sure how Barry knew that Cutter Moran was this Lena's father but she decided to let it slide. "Millie, your dad thinks you've been kidnapped."

"Well, clearly he's mistaken," Iris sassed as she too rose to her feet, draping herself lovingly around Lena from behind. Lena let out a delightful snort of amusement and threaded her fingers through Iris's at her waist.

Kara's chest felt like it might implode and possibly explode at the same time.

"He really wants you to come home," Barry said gently.

"Listen," Iris said, resting her chin on Lena's shoulder, "I am never going back there."

"Mm-mm," Lena shook her head in agreement, pulling Iris's arms a little tighter around herself.

Oh god, oh god, oh god-

"Why not?" Kara spoke up, determined to at least try to keep herself on track with this 'script'. "There's n-no place like home." Even she winced as she finished.

"Liza Moran is my home," Millie replied without missing a beat, placing a soft kiss on Lena's cheek.

Not Lena, Liza…

She could almost feel Barry grimacing beside her, just as hard as she was.

Yeah, because the way he feels about Iris is the same way I feel about Lena-

Shut up, brain! It'd never work, and Lena doesn't even like you like that, so don't go thinking about it!

"And besides," Liza continued, her face hardening again, "if our geezers ever caught wind of this, they'd go to war." She glanced at Millie, aching sadness in her eyes as Millie tenderly fussed with her collar. "It'd be the end of more than just us, huh?"

Kara hated seeing Lena sad. Hated it.

She also hated seeing Lena intimately sharing that sadness with someone that wasn't her.

Not Lena, Liza!

"Yeah, Liza's right," Millie said, her expression pained. "Our fathers hate each other. Our love is forbidden."

There was a tiny part of Kara that was irritated by Millie's melodramatic tone and expression, but it was at least possible that that irritation was based more on jealousy than anything else.

"This is just like West Side Story," Barry murmured beside her.

"I was thinking more Fantasticks," Kara replied reflexively, "but-"

"Look," Millie cut her off, "the point is we ain't telling nobody nothing. And neither are you, capisce?"

There's no need for bad grammar. And Lena can't stand bad grammar-

Yes, and it's Liza who's in love with Millie, not Lena!

"'Capisce'," Kara muttered, trying to reign in both her sense of helpless frustration and her juvenile, jealous irritation.

"Can you give us a second?" Barry piped up after an awkward moment's silence and Kara was jolted out of her thoughts by his hand landing firmly but carefully on her shoulder.

"Sure," Millie said, and Barry pulled Kara around and away a few paces.

"Kara, who the hell is that and why are you so freaked out?!"

"I'm not freaked out-"

"Kara," he stopped her, keeping his voice low but firm. "I'd love to take the time to let you work your way up to telling me but we're on a limited time frame here; we're working together and I can't do that without the full picture."

She sighed, took a deep breath and met his eyes, saw the care and the lack of judgement.

"It's Lena Luthor."

"Luthor? Luthor…Aren't the Luthors the people that hate Supers and used Kryptonite to try and kill-"

"Lena's not like her family!" Kara hissed sharply, regretting her tone slightly as Barry's eyebrows shot up. "Everybody treats her like she's evil but all she's ever done is be good and kind and strong and totally willing to risk herself for the sake of others, including me. But nobody ever cares about that, do they!?" she couldn't help her rising anger. "As soon as anything bad happens, they're all, 'Ah ha, we'd better go and investigate that Lena Luthor!' and-"

"Kara…" Barry began, his eyes gentle and full of an awful lot of understanding that Kara wasn't really ready to deal with.

"Okay, look," she cut him off, "that Jerk-Guy says we need to follow the script-"

"Music Meister?"

"He has a name? Right, well, we're in a musical," she said, dragging them back on track and off her complicated feelings about Lena Luthor. "So, I think if we convince them to tell their fathers that they're in love, maybe that'll get us out of here."

"And back home to being single… yay," Barry concluded, and Kara couldn't help but note that he had apparently mastered sarcasm at this level. "At least we'll be single together," he said, cocking his head and trying to be positive.

"Has saying that ever made anyone feel better?" Kara couldn't help question.

"Debatable," Barry asserted, before they both turned around to be confronted by the sight of Millie and Liza happily wrapped up in each other again. Kara nearly choked. Barry cleared his throat. "Okay," he began as the two women deigned to turn their attention to them again, "so look, your fathers aren't perfect, right?"

"Love isn't perfect," Kara chimed in, trying not to think about how perfect Lena looked in her wide-legged trousers, crisp shirt and suspenders.

Liza! Not Lena!

"No," Barry continued, "but you can't let your love for somebody cause you to be afraid of what might happen. You gotta take the good with the bad, no matter what."

"Right," Kara chorused, trying not to look at Lena too much, especially not at the way her arm was wrapped intimately around Iris's waist now, her thumb rubbing small circles against Iris's hip.

"And that includes telling your fathers how you two feel about each other."

Silence rang for a moment until-

"Alright, you make a convincing argument," Millie said brightly, her facing lighting up as if a switch had just been flicked.

"You do," Liza agreed, nodding thoughtfully as if she was running her fiercely intelligent mind through a long list of powerful arguments that she could not refute.

"We'll do it," Millie continued. "We'll tell them about us, right?" she looked at Liza, smiling hopefully.

"Well, we should go now," Liza nodded, her face also bright and hopeful. "Gee, thanks, kid," she said, bestowing one of those glorious smiles on Kara, and Kara was so bamboozled she didn't know how to even think about responding. She watched, slack jawed as Liza and Millie quickly set about getting ready to leave, Liza tenderly draping a scarf around Millie's shoulders before offering her arm.

In a matter of seconds, Kara and Barry were left alone in the apartment, staring after the hastily departing couple.

"Wow," Barry murmured as the door swung behind them.

"Okay," Kara said, still staring, "uh, convincing people in musicals is- is really easy."

"Yeah," Barry agreed, before giving himself a little shake. "Let's hope getting out of one is just as easy."

He met her gaze and held it for a moment.

"Are you alright?" he asked and Kara felt her insides roil again.

"Me? I'm- I'm fine," she tried to pass it off but knew it wasn't working by his facial expression. "Really, though, we should catch up with them. I can't imagine we're supposed to just let them wander off by themselves."

"You're right," he nodded but caught her arm before she could go. "Kara I don't know exactly what's going on between you and Lena, but I can tell that you really care about her."

"I-"

"Even just the fact that it was her in here, not Mon-El… Music Meister said this was what our minds dreamed up, so she's clearly pretty important to you even without the way you talk about her."

"Oh Rao," Kara groaned as a thought hit her, "I just hope that nothing's happening to the people we dragged into this in the real world."

"I don't think so," Barry tried to reassure her. "He said it's in our minds; just remember that this is Liza, not Lena. We just need to keep it together in here and then we can deal with the real world when we get back. Ok?"

"Ok," Kara said with a sigh.

"Ok, we'd better catch up."

They ran down the hallway and quickly caught up with Liza and Millie down a couple of flights of stairs, slightly ruing the fact that their lack of super powers meant that they were a little out of breath. Despite some initial wariness, especially on Liza's part, the two women agreed to let Kara and Barry go with them.

After some discussion, they had decided to tell their fathers separately, wanting to spare each other any initial bad reactions and give their fathers some time to adjust, but that made for a very difficult decision for Barry and Kara.

"I don't want to leave her, Barry," Kara said, when Barry suggested that they both go back to Digsy Foss with Iris, seeing as Digsy was the man who had hired them on pain of death. He gave her a bit of a look but let it slide.

"Ok, well I don't want to leave Iris either." They looked at each other, both wincing in advance of the conclusion.

"Splitting up doesn't really seem like the best idea," Kara said hesitantly.

"I know," Barry agreed, "but it looks like it might be our only option." He cocked his head, considering. "At least it doesn't seem too unlikely in terms of the script – it would be weird if our two characters never did anything independently…?"

"I guess," Kara said, nodding, doing her best not to look as Liza and Millie gave each other some very extensive goodbye kisses. Barry saw her determinedly not looking at something and looked over his shoulder curiously, quickly looking away and grimacing. "Yeah," Kara agreed. "Let's get them away from each other, shall we."

"Let's," Barry said fervently.

And so it was that Kara found herself alone with Liza.

Kara wasn't sure whether or not to be glad that it wasn't a particularly long walk back to Cutter Moran's club. Being with Liza made it impossible not to think about Lena, about the way her heart always lifted when they were together, about the way she could never help herself from staring at her friend in a way that was really more than friendly, about the way she so relished the way Lena felt in her arms when they had hugged, the way her heart had almost completely stopped when Lillian's henchmen had pushed Lena from her balcony and Kara had only just got there in time….

Don't think about that! She's fine, you saved her; she's fine.

A little shudder ran through her.

"You ok?" Liza asked, squinting at her as they walked.

"Me?" Kara asked, completely flustered and embarrassed. "Yes! I'm fine, just- just dandy!"

Why do I always have to say such particularly weird things around her. It's not even really-real her and I still-

"If you're sure?" Liza said sceptically, that eyebrow doing its thing again, making Kara choke and look away.

"I am," Kara managed, clearing her throat firmly. "But how about you? How are you feeling about talking to your dad? I know he can be a bit…" She trailed off with a kind of 'yikes' expression.

Even in this world, Lena got landed with difficult parents…

"He certainly can," Liza replied with Lena's trademark smirk, making Kara's stomach flutter. "But, it's like you said, we shouldn't let fear of our parents' reactions determine our lives."

Kara tried not to react to the immediate flash of memory as she remembered her Lena saying something almost identical about not living in fear.

Not 'my' Lena! The real Lena! She's definitely not my-

"But still," Liza said with a little self-deprecating shrug that was so reminiscent of Lena that it hurt, "I'd be lying if I said I wasn't more than a little nervous." She sighed heavily, patting her flawless hair in place. "He hates Digsy Foss." She glanced up at Kara and Kara's heart ached for the sadness she saw in Liza's green eyes that were so like Lena's. "I mean," she snuffed a small laugh, "really hates him. And anyone associated with him. It's just hard to see how he could ever accept Millie the way I want him to."

Kara took a deep breath.

"Well," she began, searching her own heart for the advice and words of comfort she knew Liza needed to hear. "It's not easy when there's that kind of history." She said the words, unable not to feel the reverberating parallels. "When you know that your family and people you care about have strong prejudices against the person you love, but," she sighed, feeling her own heart hammering at the implications if she finished this sentence, "but I guess you've got to decide whether or not you think that risk is worth it, whether you trust your dad to see past his prejudices and trust you, trust your judgement and your love."

Holy Rao….

I know Lena would be worth it…I guess that means I need to trust Alex and Eliza….and Kal….

But there's still the part where Lena doesn't feel that way about me…

Unless she does…

She doesn't.

I'd know….I think…I mean, I guess-

"You're right," Liza said beside her, coming to a sudden halt, and Kara looked up in surprise to see that they were standing outside the club's main entrance. "I know that she's worth it, and worth fighting for if I need to." She paused, her hand reaching out to grip Kara's forearm. "Thank you, Kara; you're a real peach."

Oh Rao…

Kara gulped and could not but follow as Liza strode purposefully into the building. They made their way through the lobby, down through the darkened corridors towards the main hall, Liza glancing left and right as they went.

"Hey, Pablo," she called, spotting him by the bar. "Have you seen my father?"

Pablo's eyes widened as he glanced from Liza to Kara and back again.

"Uh," he started, his voice shaking slightly, "last- uh, last I saw him, he was heading backstage, ma'am."

"Cheers, doll," Liza, drawled with a smile and strode off again.

"What the heck, Kara," Pablo hissed at her as she passed.

"I- I didn't- we-" she couldn't think of a proper answer quick enough and found herself shrugging helplessly at him before scurrying off after Liza again.

"Ok," Liza stopped sharply in the doorway and Kara nearly ran into her back before she noticed that Liza's eyes were fixed on the back of her father's head. She heard the smaller woman blow out a quick breath before she stood up as tall as she could, muttered a quick, "Wish me luck, kid," at Kara, and strode into the room.

Oh Rao, this better work…

"Hello, father," Liza said, her voice betraying none of her nerves as she approached the notoriously scary man she'd been lumped with for a father.

"Liza," Cutter said sharply, looking up from the papers he was browsing through. "I was beginning to wonder where you'd wandered off to this time."

Kara only noticed the deep, uncomfortable breath that Liza took because she was watching so closely.

"Well, father, as it happens, that's actually what I've come here to talk to you about."

"Really?" Cutter asked, his brow furrowing as he slowly stood up, taking a few steps towards his daughter. "Are you actually deigning to seek my opinion on something for once?"

"Well," Liza swallowed, her breathing coming a little faster, "yes and no, actually."

"Yes and no?"

"Yes," Liza said firmly, "because, as it happens, what I wanted to tell you is that I'm in love." Kara watched as Cutter's eyes widened for a long second before his brow furrowed; Liza's back straightened that extra millimetre and her chin rose in an incredibly familiar gesture of determination. "And, you ought to know now that nothing you say will change my mind or my heart, but I would like your approval."

"Ok," he said, advancing on her slowly; Kara had to work hard not leap in front of Liza and force him to back off. "Well, who's the lucky man that you think I might try and change your mind about?"

Liza took a deep breath.

"Millie Foss."

Cutter's face blanched white and then flushed red.

"Millie Foss? Millie Foss?! Have you lost your mind?" he demanded, his finger pointing accusingly as he began to pace back and forth. "She is the daughter of my enemy. Digsy Foss is a dirty, rotten scoundrel, and the apple doesn't fall far from the tree!"

"Father, if you just let me explain-"

"There's nothing to explain, Liza."

"Yes, there is," Liza insisted firmly, standing her ground. "You and Foss have hated each other so long I doubt you can even remember what got you so riled up in the first place. And I won't have you speak about Millie like that." Liza's eyes grew soft and imploring as she grasped at Cutter's forearm, halting his pacing. "I love her."

He froze, searching his daughter's face, his dark frown gradually loosening.

"Sir," Kara forced herself to speak up, certain that this 'script' wouldn't let her off without saying something in this pivotal plot moment. "I've seen them together, they- they really love each other." Boy, was that hard to say. "Would it really be so wrong to trust in love for once? To trust that their love could conquer all the bad blood between you and Digsy?"

And then, seemingly out of nowhere, soft guitar music began to play.

At first Kara thought something was wrong with her eyes because half of the room seemed to be phasing slightly out of reality, the shimmering image of Digsy Foss's warehouse phasing in its place.

"Velvet, I can wish you For the collar of your coat,

And fortune smiling all along your way."

Somehow, despite being halfway across town, the scene that was presumably taking place in Digsy Foss's warehouse was also audible and visible here. She watched as Millie's two dads sang to her of all the things they wished for her, watched Barry nodding along in adorably dorky admiration, and watched as Liza and Cutter Moran appeared to find nothing strange about this sudden musical invasion of their space. Which of course all made 'sense' when the music swelled and Cutter began his own verse.

The music and the lyrics were so beautiful, and Liza's face was so grateful and hopeful, that Kara couldn't help but feel that tightening in her chest again. Her own longing for this kind of love and acceptance was truly beyond description, beyond even her own realisation of it. Her heart ached.

All too soon, the beautiful harmonies faded, the guitar and the scene from Digsy's warehouse disappeared, and only Kara, Liza and Cutter were left in the quiet room.

"I appreciate your honesty, Liza," Cutter said with a deep breath as he approached his daughter, reaching out to gently cup her cheek with one hand.

"Thank you, father," Liza murmured, her voice only shaking a little.

"Come here," Cutter said softly, pulling her into a warm hug and holding her close.

Maybe…maybe this…maybe I could…maybe Lena-

Kara had to stop herself before her heart started to hope too hard.

Especially when Cutter glanced up from the hug, catching Kara's gaze, and his eyes were cold and hard, calculating and dangerous.

Did he just-

No, I don't think-

I'm just being paranoid. That song was way too good to be a fake.

I think.

Still, Kara couldn't shake the cold from her heart as she watched Cutter squeeze his daughter tightly for one moment more before releasing her, tenderly touching a finger under her chin for a moment, before turning and leaving the room.

As he left, she saw him saying something to one of his henchmen but had no super-hearing with which to listen in.

Crap.


Dun-dun-duuuunnnn!

Welp, I hope you're liking this because it's been hella fun to write :)