Note: So, an idea hit me in the planning stages of this story. An idea that was half-filler until we hit the major bits with the actual villain of the story (because their introduction was always going to have to be sudden in execution no matter how it was done, so it was always a question of how long do I wait to do that), half essential characterization for this version of Supergirl. So strap in for some essential characterization filler for the next chapter or two, everybody!

The Last Daughter

Chapter 4

Public Relations Part 1

"The League haven't even told us who or what this new alien is, but anyone can see the truth clear as day. She's a threat." Kara frowned to herself as footage ran of her accidental rampage through Kal's city. She'd heard later that she'd managed not to kill anyone on accident. A few people had been hospitalized, but nothing too major.

"Why are you watching that crap?" Kara turned to see Superboy walking towards her. She hadn't yet asked him exactly who he was in relation to Kal. She didn't feel they knew each other well enough for that question to be proper. "Godfrey's a cheap hack at best, and a shill for the Light at worst." He saw that Kara had no idea who he was talking about. "They're this bunch of supervillains, been causing trouble for, well, as long as I've been alive. Longer, even."

"I'm not disagreeing that he's inflammatory," Kara admitted as the footage cut back to the suited man, who picked his rant up again. "But he's not entirely wrong either. I was a danger then. I'm still a danger now, I just don't want to be one. And from what Kal's told me, he's representative of how a lot of the planet feels now about visitors from other worlds."

"Pretty open-minded of you." Superboy said, giving her a surprised look.

"Mom and Dad and Z... I was always taught to look at all points of view, especially the ones I may not agree with. To look for the value." Kara didn't like that she kept catching herself when it came to Zod.

"So what value do see in this guy?" Superboy waved to the TV mounted into the wall.

"I see fear. I see that people down there don't know me. They don't know what I can do or what I want or where I came from. They just know that some strange girl crashed in a spaceship, smashed up a city, and that their most famous hero boxed her up and took her somewhere."

"So what are you gonna do about it?" Superboy asked. It sounded like he didn't really expect an answer. So Kara took some satisfaction from turning to him with a wide smile on her face.

"I've got a few ideas."

"No." Batman's tone brooked absolutely no room for debate.

"I really think it would help. If I could make some sort of personal public announcement, maybe even try and talk this Gordon into an-" Kara tried to explain herself as Batman strode through the station, and she followed close behind. While technically, she'd been told that the organization Kal was a part of voted on major events regarding planetary security and membership, she could easily tell who carried how much weight in reality. Batman was significant. If she could convince him, getting everyone else to agree would be easy.

"Engaging in that sort of dialogue gives people like Godfrey a level of power and validation they don't need or deserve. The last thing the League needs is Superman's cousin engaging him in a debate on international television," They moved out of the labs, and started heading towards the transporter (Kara knew there was a proper name for them, but she couldn't keep it in her head for some reason) room in the center of the station. "More to the point, efforts are already underway to build a cover identity for you, to allow easy integration onto Earth when you're off-duty. Assuming you join of course. Going public now like you're suggesting completely-" He stopped short as Kara shot in front of him, floating up off the ground and reaching eye level.

"With all due respect, that's not happening." She said, trying to keep her voice steady.

"If you don't want to join the Team or League, that's entirely understandable. All the more reason to get-"

"I am not hiding who I am." She said, perhaps a bit louder than she meant to. She could feel the room freeze, and every eye turn towards the two of them. She realized that she was probably doing something very few people did, by arguing with Batman. "I am Kara Zor-El of Krypton. And that's all I will ever be."

"Cover identities are a necessity even for those of who are less active in protecting Earth or with superpowers. It's a safeguard-" Batman tried to push the issue, his tone again making it clear he expected no resistance. She was going to have to disappoint him.

"I've buried almost everyone and everything I've ever known," Kara cut in. "My home. My friends. My parents. My world. All I've got left is Kal, my ship, and who. I. Am." Kara took a steadying breath. "I'm not burying that, too." She turned in the air and floated off, making sure to go slow to emphasize her point.

"Tell me you're gonna wear the crash suit." Kid Flash asked. It was easier to try and remember everyone by their hero names, at least for now.

"Wasn't planning to. I'm trying to convince your planet that I'm not a threat, that I want to live here peacefully and help where I'm needed. Coming out in full war armor is gonna undercut my point a little."

"Well, you can't just wear regular clothes. You do know that, right? No way anyone will believe anything you say if you're just wearing what Conner wears all the time." Tigress asked her.

"I'm aware." Kara replied, smirking. "You'll see what I've got planned. I'll meet you all in the… zeta room." The word finally came to her.

She slid the door to her temporary quarters shut. She'd dragged the warsuit in from the labs. To be sure, wearing the full suit would absolutely send the wrong message. She was trying to convince a planet's worth of frightened people whom she'd already made a poor first impression on that they could trust her. That she was no danger to them. But there was another reason. One she didn't want to tell anyone else. She wasn't ready to wear the warsuit. Wasn't ready to take on the burden and responsibility and all that came with the last remnant of Krypton's culture, and all that such a particular relic implied and stood for.

Fortunately, she'd realized, she could compromise on that front. She wasn't ready to stand for all that Kyrpton and the warsuit stood for, and she knew that. But someone else on Earth had spent a lifetime making another suit stand for things she was ready for. Probably. Maybe.

"Can't believe I let her talk me into this." Batman muttered to himself.

"As I recall, there wasn't much talking you into anything," Superman said, a smile on his face. Everyone in the Watchtower had been astounded and more than a little satisfied to see Batman inadvertently get a taste of his own medicine when it came to arguing. "She told you exactly how things were going to happen, and didn't let you argue otherwise."

"And you think all of this is a good idea?" Batman asked incredulously.

"It's her life. No one can tell her how to live it, and I don't think what she wants out of it is at all unreasonable, considering what she's been through." He turned his attention as he saw other members of the League and Team shift towards the pathway to the quarters. Kara floated in, and let herself land lightly. Superman guessed she'd pulled her clothing out of her warsuit, and it honestly shocked him how similar, yet different their suits were.

A blue bodysuit, with red boots, a cape that locked in to latches built into the collar, and dark blue metal vambraces wound over her forearms. Segmenting lines, probably meant to help it fit into the armor, ran in red highlights throughout the whole form. Superman could see the material was not like any on Earth, and even the scheme of colors wasn't entirely exact. The blue was deeper, darker. The yellow portions seemed almost gilded, the reds muted by comparison.

Kara was clearly not quite expecting all the attention directed her way, nor the effect the suit was having on everyone else in the room. A sense of approval permeated the zeta bay. He walked towards her, and set a hand on her shoulder when they reached each other.

"You look good." He said.

She approached the podium in front of the building Kal called the Hall of Justice, trying to look far more confident than she actually felt. The press below, cameras flashing, microphones at the ready. She knew it was her idea, but that didn't stop the fact that to think she could do this, and actually doing it, were two very different things.

She tapped the microphones set into the podium, and winced at the feedback. She winced, and drawing on her speed, took a glance back at Kal, standing at the front of the entire assembled Justice League. He nodded.

"Now you can say it really does happen to everyone." Kara opened, her need to break the tension running ahead of her actual plans. But she could see it worked regardless. See the smiles coming to the crowd's faces, hear the chuckles covered by hands. "I imagine it's accurate to say that most, if not all of you, have at least seen me by now. I recognize I didn't make the best first impression when I got to this world, and I apologize for that." She shifted her grip on the podium, taking a breath. "You've all seen me. But I can't imagine you know me. That's what I'm here today to change. I am Kara Zor-El, of Krypton. Cousin to men you know as Superman and Superboy." She paused to gather herself, and could hear the chatter in the crowd. Some believed her. Some didn't. "I don't expect you to take me on faith. Not because of what I can do, who I say I am, who I say I'm related to," She laughed to herself and pulled at the battle suit. "Or because of what I wear." That got some outright laughs from the crowd. "If you are willing to give me the chance, I will do all I can to prove myself to you." She took another breath. "When I learned that my cousin, the older one," She clarified to a few more chuckles, "Had become a defender of this world, I thought it was wonderfully ironic. I mean, I can see it now, but when I left our world, he hadn't even been born. And I'd always imagined him following in his parents' footsteps, and in those of my parents. Becoming a great thinker, a teacher, a person of exceptional knowledge, who would put their mind towards solving the great problems of their time. My family had a terrible problem to try and solve. Our world was dying. They had to try and figure out how to save it, and then how to save all of us when they realized there was nothing they could do for the world itself."

She stopped at that, at voicing that hopeful dream, what should have been. Uncle Jor and Aunt Lara should've been standing beside their son; Krypton's many survivors should've been living side by side with the people of Earth for decades. "I myself pursued a different path. I wanted to become a protector of Krypton. A warrior. A soldier. A peacekeeper. My family and the man who would train me all asked: Why? Why become a guardian of a dying world that you will have to either leave or die with?" She couldn't help herself now. She could feel a tear track down her cheek. But she let it sit. "And I told them, that it was because our world was dying, it was all the more important it have defenders, so it could survive to be saved. That it dying made standing in its defense all the more meaningful." She felt another tear drop, and now she had to reach to wipe them away. "It wasn't to be that simple, sadly. Invaders and pettiness and stupidity kept my people from being able to save themselves. Now my cousins and I are all that is left." She paused to relax her grip on the podium. She didn't to crush it between her hands on live tv. "And just as it was true when I was pursuing my path, that guarding a dying world was all the more important, so is that true for us now, as the last sons and daughters of Kyrpton. It falls to us to be the greatest paragons of virtue that we can be, in honor of the world we have lost. To ensure that the light and greatness of our people did not die out with our world." She reached down to tug on her suit again, shifting the House symbol down slightly, and into greater view of the cameras. "I'm told that on this world, this symbol is an S. It's how my cousin got his second name. But on Kyrpton, it was the symbol of the House of El. A great family that produced even greater warriors, thinkers, scientists and leaders for over a thousand generations. And the symbol they took, in our language, means Hope. Within that ideal of Hope, everlasting, was the fundamental belief in the potential of every living being to be a force for good. That's what I wanted to be. And what I still want to be, if you'll give me the chance to try."

So, a bunch of ideas really kicked this off. First, Kara would absolutely need to make a public statement and would absolutely get eaten alive by the press and Godfrey beforehand after her arrival and accidental rampage in Chapter 1. But those realities also present great opportunity for characterization. As far as the argument with Batman, the SuperKids (Superboy, Supergirl) are great for being vehicles to buck comic book tropes. Superboy refuses to wear a supersuit because seriously, what's the point? It's not like it'll make his powers any stronger if he's in spandex. Why not just wear what he's comfortable in while he beats up supervillains? Supergirl, in this instance, is bucking against the Rule-of-God that just about every superhero ever must have a secret identity that they use to interact with the world when they aren't superhero-ing. And Kara, understandably I think, considering her situation, just says 'Screw. That. I'm Kara Zor-El and I don't want or need to hide who I am.'

As far as Kara's suit, I was trying to get across the similar-but-different idea. Her suit is 100% Kryptonian in origin, unlike Superman's (I'm running with the classic idea that his supersuit is based around his Kryptonian baby clothes, but made nonetheless of Earth-based materials), and thus has a vast difference in terms of materials and some in terms of style (like the muted reds and gold tint to the yellow areas). It's nature as a suit built explicitly for soldiers (it's the interior, emergency-use-battle-suit of the actual armored warsuit, basically) also means it's going to have features Superman's suit doesn't, like the segmented inlays for fitting on the armor, and the vambraces. It'd also take Darksied or Doomsday to make the reference for a Battle-Damaged Supergirl action figure in this case, because her suit is also explicitly made to be able to tank hits and take the edge off major hits.