Cat strode out of her personal elevator like she owned the place, which she did, but it never hurt to remind her various minions of that fact. That reminder was half the reason she'd wanted the personal elevator in the first place. Not having to swim to the fortieth floor in cheap cologne and germs was the other.

One of the minions, her newest assistant, approached her with a cup from Noonans.

"Your Latte Ms. Grant," the girl said, and Cat just looked down at the tray she held in her hand which was loaded with two Cups and a bag from Noonans, then back up at the girl.

"Um, never mind?" The girl said, taking a step back.

Cat shook her head and turned away from her office, heading towards the main elevator before taking a sharp right and walking down the hall to Kara's office. She slowed as she heard voices coming out of Kara's open door.

"I don't have time for this right now. Snapper's already upset that I missed two and a half days of work. I have to finish the edits on the Refugee story for the next issue of the magazine, and come up with something to file for the Tribune if I want to keep my job."

"Well, when do you want to talk about it? Because you haven't been answering your phone."

"I don't know, James. I'm not sure I *ever* want to talk about it."

"Kara…"

"I think she made herself perfectly clear, Mr. Oslen," Cat said as she walked in through Kara's office door. "And, since I know for a fact that I don't have the photo essay, or the expanded layout for Kara's refugee piece I asked for, you should be in your little glass box, working."

James glared at her for just a moment, but the challenge in his eyes melted away after just a couple of seconds and he left wearing the pout Cat found so annoying on his face. She watched him go, then pushed the door closed behind him before turning back to Kara. She crossed the office in a couple of steps and set down.

"Thank you, Ms. Grant."

"Don't think anything of it, Kara. He was out of line bringing it up in the office. Especially with the door open."

Kara sighed. "I needed to hear that."

Cat felt her heckles rising, and she could practically hear the part of the conversation she missed. Oslen would have insisted Kara owed it to him to hear what he had to say, and try to guilt her for not wanting to talk about it right that second. She tamped down on the anger that was building, and picked up Kara's drink from the tray, passing it over to her.

"Pumpkin Spice, extra foam, with cinnamon on top," she said. She opened the bag, and pulled out her own bagel sandwich, then passed the bag over to Kara. "Three orange cinnamon buns."

Kara smiled. "How did you manage that? They're always out of the orange ones by the time I get there."

"Mmmm," Cat said as she shrugged. "I'm Cat Grant."

Kara laughed, and Cat had to take a deep breath to stop the little flutter in her heart at that sound.

"Thank you, Ms. Grant."

"Kara."

"Yes?"

"I want to ask you two favors."

Kara sat up a little straighter. "What can I do for you?"

"First, you can call me Cat," she said. "It's not a privilege I extend most people, but you've more than earned it, even without all you've done for me as Supergirl."

"Really?" Kara asked.

"Yes," she said. "And I'm sorry I didn't ask sooner, because I should have."

"It's okay-"

"No, it's not," Cat said. She looked Kara in the eyes. "When you were out there, fighting that thing, I was worried about Supergirl because I know how much this city needs her, but I was terrified for my friend. The one who saved my job, and who brought my son back into my life, and who spent two years putting up with every nasty thing I could throw at her, while taking care of me in ways I doubt I'll ever know about. Which brings me to the second favor."

"What's that?"

"I don't expect this to be a problem, because I know you have several people who can and are perfectly willing to throw James Olsen through a building if he becomes an issue, but Kara, promise me that you'll let me know if it comes to a point where one of you has to leave."

"Cat-"

"No, Kara. I mean it. James Olsen is a very good art director, but you are irreplaceable."
Kara was silent for a moment, and Cat looked down and her bagel, unwrapping it as she pretended not to notice while Kara took a tissue and wiped her eyes.

"Thank you."

Cat looked up and pushed her latte towards Kara. "You can thank me by heating that up."
Kara smiled and reached for the cup, and Cat watched in fascination as Kara zapped the Latte with her heat vision, before passing it back to her. Cat had to take a sip to keep herself from smiling at the proud little puppy dog expression Kara was wearing. She sat the cup back down, and looked at Kara.

"So, I had an idea for an article for the Tribune that I think you would be uniquely qualified to write."

"Oh?"

"Yes. I want you to write a tribute to the agents who died fighting Doomsday."

Cat watched as Kara's face fell. "Me?"

Cat nodded. "Yes."

"Miss Gr… Cat, I'm not sure-"

Cat leaned forward, resting her hand on Kara's. "Kara, you need to do this."

"But why?"

"Because you knew them. Because this is how you can change the world. People see Supergirl, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Batman, Cyborg, Superman, the Flash, and it brings them hope for a better world. It lets them know that there are people out there who care, who are trying to make a difference. But this, this will let them know they can make a difference too. And when they believe in themselves, that's when they'll go out and start trying to make that difference. You can give them that. But more than that, you need to do this for yourself, to remind yourself of who these people where, and why they chose to follow you. So you can find peace with it."

Kara looked at her for a moment, then nodded. "I'll need to make some calls," she said.

"Okay, but let's finish breakfast first," Cat said.


The pounding in Cat's head had been steadily building all day. First, the idiot running the sports desk for the Trib had turned up drunk in the middle of the fucking Olympics. She'd tried to fire him, only to have the CatCo employee union step in and tell her she had to give him a chance to go through rehab first. She'd spent hours going back and forth with them, only to have legal step in and take their side. She'd finally bought out the six months remaining on the man's contract, just to get rid of him, and promoted the assistant editor who'd been doing most of his work anyway.

If that hadn't been bad enough, Carter's father had called to tell Cat he was cancelling, again. Cat always had mixed feelings about things like that when it happened. She hated not having Carter, and as always delighted to have more time with him, but she hated her ex-husband for disappointing her son, who always asked for so little. She could give Carter anything in the world, but he never really asked for anything aside from a few comic books, the occasional video game, and various tools. The only real place she had to indulge him was his obsession with all things Supergirl. He had pretty much every piece of Supergirl memorabilia she could lay her hands on. But her husband couldn't even be bothered to show up and take their son to a damn amusement park.

"You look like you could use this," Kara said.

Cat looked up to find Kara standing in front of her, holding a small glass dish with two advil in it.

"Thank you," Cat said as she reached for the pills.

"I heard about the sports editor," she said as she sat down. "I texted Eve, and told her to bring you these, but she texted back that you had her take the CatCopter to Keystone city to get you a Cronut."

"She was getting on my nerves," Cat said before taking a pull off her water bottle. She popped the Advil, then swallowed them. "I thought you'd be happy I didn't just fire her."

"Oh, I am. I'd even call this progress, if she wasn't even more terrified of helicopters than you are."

"They say adversity builds character," Cat replied as she leaned back, closer her eyes, and rubbed her temples.

"Did you have your Lexipro this morning?" Kara asked.

"Yes," Cat said, smiling as. "The reminder you set in my Outlook helps with that."

"Sunglasses are in your top drawer, left hand side," Kara said.

Cat reached down and opened the drawer, finding the sunglasses by feel and putting them on. "Thank you," she said as she opened her eyes, and didn't immediately feel like someone had driven an ice pick into her brain."

"Carter's dad cancelled again, huh?"

"How'd you know?"

"You always used to send me across the bay to Vic's to get you a cheese steak when he pissed you off."

"You noticed that?"

"I noticed everything, Cat."

Cat balled her hands into fists, squeezing tightly to keep her heart from fluttering the way it always did when Kara said things like that. The girl had no idea what those little statements did to Cat's emotional state, the way every little reminder that the girl cared for her made the longing that much worse. She just had to remind herself it wasn't the girl's fault, over and over again.

"It kept you safe," she said. "I was afraid I'd fire you when I was mad at him."

"I know," Kara replied. "Though it took me a long time to figure that one out. I thought you were just eating your emotions, until I realized you liked the cheese steaks from Vinny's better than the one from Vic's."

"Vinny's sautés their onions and green peppers with kielbasa," Cat said.

"Better bread, too."

"I read over the Doomsday tributes," Cat said. She didn't even need to open her eyes to feel the way Kara tensed up. "They were really well done, Kara. Better than the Refugee piece."

"Thank you," Kara replied.

"How do you feel?" she asked.

"Better," Kara said. "You were right. I thought it would be terrible, and at first, it was, but it also helped a lot."

They sat there in silence for a while, until Cat could feel the pressure start to ease in her head. When she opened her eyes, she found Kara just sitting there, a contented smile on her face, and thought that if she'd known it would mean she would get moments like this, she would have promoted Kara a lot sooner.

Unfortunately, what she saw behind Kara spoiled the effect a bit. James Oslen was standing there next to the hobbit's desk, and she could practically feel the jealousy radiating off him. It wasn't the first time it had happened. When she'd called him on the carpet for the way he was treating Kara after her little close encounter of the mind altering substance kind, she'd apparently given away more than she thought, because there had been a subtle shift in the way James looked at her whenever she was around Kara.

On the other hand, given what she'd heard from Kara, there was a small part of her that was beginning to think Lucy's catty comments about Superman being James' secret boyfriend weren't entirely off the mark. Oh, she didn't think anything ever actually happened there. Clark Kent was so hopelessly devoted to Lois Lane she doubted he'd even noticed his best friend crushing on him.

"Do you need me to clear your schedule for the weekend?" Kara asked.

Cat refocused her gaze on Kara. "No. I appreciate it, but I'll have Eve do it. As much as I miss your efficiency and attention to detail, it's not fair to either of you to ask you to step in and do her job."

"You're right. I just…" Kara blushed and looked down at her knees.

"What?"

"You'll think it's silly," she said.

"I doubt I'll find it as silly as you continuing to wear those hideous cardigans when I know for a fact that you have better fashion sense than most of Miranda Priestly's staff."

Kara laughed, and shook her head. "I don't want you to think I'm not grateful for the promotion, but I liked taking care of you," she said, blushing even harder than before.

Cat tried to say something, but found she couldn't speak around the lump in her throat, so instead, she reached over and picked up her bottle of water, taking a drink while she ran through the calming exercises Dr. Shuman had given her for when her anxiety flared up. She knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, she should have never even considered what she did next, because she knew what it would do to her, how it would make her feel, but the longing on Kara's face was too much for her, and the words were spilling out before she could stop herself.

"Well, there is something you could do for me," Cat says.

Kara perked up, and she looked so damn enthusiastic at the idea that Cat wanted to just crawl into her lap and kiss her, because in the forty-eight years, four marriages and countless relationships, romantic and otherwise that came before, no one, save her father and her youngest son, ever made her feel half as loved or cherished as Kara Danvers did on an average day, and that was before Myriad, before the promotion, before they'd moved from boss and employee to friends.

"Six Flags Nation's Bay opened a Supergirl themed roller coaster last week," Cat said.

"Oh," Kara said. "I hadn't heard."

"Yes, well, Carter has," Cat said. "His father was supposed to take him, but since he cancelled, I'll have to do it."

"But you hate roller coasters," Kara said

"Not as much as I hate seeing Carter disappointed," Cat replied. "But I'm curious… How do you feel about roller coasters?"

Cat watched as a smile spread across Kara's face. "I love them," she said.

"Do you have any plans this weekend?"

"Yes," Kara said, and for a moment, Cat felt a sense of almost crushing disappointment, until she heard what Kara said next. "I'm going to Six Flags with my friend and her son."

The disappointment vanished, and Cat felt her heart melt, just a little bit more.