Chapter Seven: Cold Case Part Two.
Kara made her way to Arkham Asylum. The frustrations she had to undergo to even come here. She manged to pull a few strings to even make this visit happen. She shook her head when she arrived outside of the Asylum with a frown on her face, shaking her head as she did.
The guards were something that she had to deal with and it was something that Barbara warned her about. Some of the inmates heckled her when she walked past. Kara held her head up rather high and looked extremely proud. She wasn't going to be detracted no matter what. She approached the matter with all of the dignity and pride one would expect from someone like her. Shaking her head, Kara stepped forward down the hallway.
"You know, are you even sure he'll help you with the matter?" Barbara asked. "He tends to be….well he's not completely bad, but he can be a bit distant. And cold, no pun intended. His only focus tends to be on his wife, after he got revenge on the man that he's held personally responsible for his condition."
"Yes, Barbara, I know, I realize that," Kara responded. Her frown grew deeper when she shook her head. "But, do we have many other options? I don't want to leave the poor girl to rot in the cold."
Kara walked passed a cell at the edge of the block that was completely empty. Come to think of it, it was kind of unsettling the fact that she was being allowed in the Asylum pretty much unsupervised with all of the lunatics on the loose. That was just how things had been done in Gotham City.
She crossed a passing billboard that bragged there hadn't been a breakout for the past nine days. She wasn't sure that was anything to brag about.
"Remember when you're in all of the insanity, just tell yourself that it's Gotham and here it's perfectly normal," Barbara informed her.
"Right," Kara said. "I'll remember that, Barbara."
She crossed the area at the cell and he could see a bald pale man who was hunched over a table. He wore a collar on his neck. The cell he looked to be cold. One could see the man's breath in the air.
"Doctor Fries?" Kara asked.
Fries looked up, rather surprised, before he inquired, "A visitor?"
There had been no visitors since he had been put here. No friends, no family, not his old colleagues, they have all washed their hands of him. He was left alone to continue his research in Arkham. It was much safer for him to be in there, then out there. He was set up with this amazing laboratory, courtesy of the Wayne Foundation to continue his work to save his wife, who had been preserved because of her terminal illness.
He took sight of the person that he had to visit and acknowledged her presence, "Ah, yes Supergirl. I wonder what brings you to Arkham of all places. Certainly this is a long way from Metropolis. I wonder why anyone would willingly enter Gotham."
He spoke in a fairly robotic tone, detached from emotion. Emotions grew rather cold within him ever since the accident that afflicted his wife.
"Doctor Fries, I need your help," Kara admitted. She frowned when she looked at him. "It has to do with….."
"You want my insight on the ice attacks in Metropolis?" Fries asked. Kara wordlessly nodded. "I'm afraid that I cannot help you, but I can tell you one thing, this does not seem to be the handiwork of the usual suspects."
Kara figured she had better clue him in that she was a step ahead with this.
"I know who is behind this," Kara said.
"Yes, they're calling her Killer Frost, which means there is a new name on the table," Fries answered.
"She's…her name is Caitlin Snow, she's a scientist at STAR Labs," Kara said.
"Yes, I've heard of her," Fries said. "She has been studying ways to cause people to thrive in colder temperatures and also to use the intense cold for healing and reverse the effects of cold related ailments. I had followed her work, in the hopes that it might bear some fruit in helping with my own mission. My beloved Nora continues to linger and nothing that I have done seems to work. Could you describe Doctor Snow's condition to me?
Fries paused for a moment and allowed the girl to explain what the condition of the STAR Labs scientist was. He took a few moments to mull it over in his mind and he nodded in response.
"Yes," Fries responded. "Her condition is far less advanced than the one that I currently experience. And her affliction is different in many ways. She appears to need body heat to sustain a more normal form and the madness is causing her mind to warp. It appears that her physical and mental state will deteriorate fast if not cured."
"I have her serum," Kara said. She looked towards him.
"Yes, I have spoken with Doctor Snow previously, before the accident and she showed me the formula for the serum she created," Fries said. He took over the sample to the mini-lab after Kara handed it to him.
Again, Kara was kind of weirded out by the fact she was able to pass things to inmates in Arkham Asylum without any kind of supervision. Fries walked over and took a look over the serum.
There was a pause of a couple of moments, even though it seemed a fair deal longer by the time Fries got done. He turned around to face Kara, his face growing into a frown.
"This is the same exact serum, although it is only a temporary fix and not a cure to Caitlin Snow's affliction," Fries informed her. Kara's face fell. "Fortunately, I have made a cure based off of her work for my affliction that wasn't strong enough. It gave me a few moments of normality, but my condition returned worse than ever."
Fries handed Kara the cure.
"Take your shot wisely," Fries said. "I can tell that you would do anything to help her, even taking the risk that this cure might not work."
"What kind of risk is there?" Kara asked. She knew that she was going to regret asking this question, but she had to ask it anyway. That was just the type of person that she was.
She could hear a distress signal coming from Chloe's watch. That caused her to stand up.
"I have to go," Kara said.
Fries could see the heroine leave as quickly as she appeared. He might have been cold emotionally, but he did feel something akin to regret. Regret he didn't tell her that the serum had just as much as a chance of curing her, rather than killing her.
"I do wish that I can still feel excitement, because that was my excitement for this day," Fries said.
He returned back to his work as casually as he could be. Perhaps one day there would be hope for Nora and for him.
"Okay, fine, I'll do what you ask," Chloe said. She hoped that Kara would pick up the signal. "Just don't lose her cool."
She could feel Caitlin's icy gaze on her neck and she realized that she might have not said the best thing. Chloe shook her head in response and frowned. She was in the back the refrigerated van, her hands on the other side of the glass. It was a means not to hurt Chloe. She didn't want to hurt anyone, not really. That was the furthest thing from her mind, and if she could help it, she would not hurt her.
"Okay, that was the worst choice of words….." Chloe said. "So, why…why me of all people?"
"Your friend was asking too many questions," Caitlin explained to her. She didn't say much more than that. "Just make a right at the next street."
Chloe hated things being awkward and silent. She didn't dare move her hand to turn on the radio, fearing that she was dealing with a woman that was a ticking time bomb and she could go off. Each movement was closer to setting her off than ever before. Chloe wondered if she dare breathe without any kind of trouble. Her hands shook when she placed them on the wheel. Her mind was going to some really bad places.
"You know, you can get some help," Chloe said.
"Yes, and how would I get that help?" Caitlin asked. "Would you send me to Belle Reve or Arkham, to be used as a lab rat? I can't even have a normal life…"
"Maybe you didn't want a normal life," Chloe offered her.
"DON'T TELL ME WHAT I WANT!" Caitlin yelled. She clenched her fists together and mentally counted to ten.
The body heat Chloe Sullivan gave off was so enticing. She felt herself getting more moody. Caitlin now knew what a junky that had been deprived of her fix felt like. She couldn't hold herself back any longer. She needed a piece of that and she needed it now.
"You know, this is a road….that you don't want to go down," Chloe said. "Whoever is blackmailing you to do this, they aren't going to help you. They're going to keep using you as a pawn. Like a lab rat as you said."
"Please, be quiet," Caitlin said. She could feel a throbbing headache. She placed her hands on the cool wall.
Breath in, breath out, deep breathing, calm down, don't give into the temptation, because there would be no turning back.
"You're a respected scientist," Chloe said. "You shouldn't be a cold blooded murderer."
"Maybe my heart being turned to ice is a good thing," Caitlin said. Her frown grew even more prominent if that was possible. "Those who I lost will no longer hurt me."
"Who is doing…"
Chloe slammed on the brakes suddenly. That caused Caitlin to nearly get launched from the back of the van into the front of it. Thankfully the thick window was there to prevent her from crashing completely through.
"What did you do that for?" Caitlin asked. She looked up and saw that Supergirl was hovering right by their side.
The door of the van was ripped open. Chloe was picked up and super sped completely out.
Caitlin got out of the van. Her fingers twitched. There were people on the street that were moving around to see the source of the wreck.
"Please, don't make me do this," she breathed.
"Caitlin, come with me, I can…"
Caitlin stepped back, fearful. She caused the air to warp around her. This was something that her powers never did before. She was creating a one woman polar vortex around her. The citizens screamed because of the unexpected snowstorm that rose around them.
Supergirl closed her eyes. She braced herself for the next impact. She had to fly through snow and ice before, so this wasn't something that she was afraid of doing. She pushed herself forward. There was a moment where she thought that she had been trapped in the midst of this intense storm.
Somehow, she pushed through. It was barely, but she pushed through. Her heart raced quicker, and she pushed forward a little bit closer. Her mind was running through several different directions when she kept up her path to the edge.
Kara groaned when Caitlin disappeared into the white out. She shifted focus to her X-Ray vision and scanned the area around the snow.
She found her outline in the white out and Kara flew forward. She used her heat vision to break through the ice and grabbed Caitlin, pushing her down onto the ground. She gently pinned her to the ground.
Caitlin could feel Kara's body heat absorb into her body. It was like a hit of her drug of choice when it filled her body. She felt tingles of excitement all the way down her spine, from the tips of her toes all the way to the edge of her ears.
"Thanks," Caitlin said in a gracious voice. Her voice perked up instantly. "I needed that."
"I don't want to hurt you," Kara warned her. She could feel a chill coming through her body and she realized that Caitlin's powers blocked out the sun partially. Her reserves were at a low. Kara straddled her down on the ground. "I don't want to hurt you, but you're out of control. And if you put innocent people in danger, I'll have no choice."
"I'm in control now!" Caitlin yelled.
She freaked out and knocked Kara off of her. She sent a fairly weakened Supergirl flying backward with a huge gust of wind.
"Oh my God, are you okay?" Caitlin asked. She could see Supergirl's eyes shut. "I didn't….I didn't….oh God."
Caitlin was jerked out of her emo trip by the sounds of the Special Crimes Unit turning up. One of them pointed a gun at her. "Freeze!"
"Seriously?"
Caitlin's hands started to shake back and forth. She couldn't control herself, and she wasn't sure if she wanted to. Her mind was a muddled mess of emotions.
She blasted two of the nearest cops and pretty much froze them, draining of them of their body heat. That caused them to fall to the ground.
It created the unfortunate hostage situation and left Supergirl with a sadistic choice. She could either go after Caitlin or stay with the hostages. The hostages came first and she prepared to defrost them. It gave the woman who they were calling Killer Frost a chance to escape.
"I think the cat's out of the bag with Caitlin Snow and Killer F…our icy friend being one and the same," Chloe said. "The question is, where did she go?"
"That's a good question," Kara said after a moment's thought.
The two of them were in the Fortress, and Kara and Lara were analyzing the serum that Doctor Fries gave her, along with the sample of Caitlin's blood that she acquired.
"Actually the better question is, how did she find me?" Chloe asked. "I'm not exactly listed in the yellow pages. You, Claire, Lana, and Lois are the only ones who know where I am."
"Given how you find addresses that shouldn't be listed all of the time, it goes without saying that someone did that to you," Kara said. She leaned back.
Chloe groaned.
"Great, someone pulled a me on me, that's pretty damn ironic," Chloe said. She frowned and corrected herself. "Actually that's more poetic than ironic when you come to think about it, but…..never mind that."
"Yes, never mind that," Kara agreed. She could see Chloe sitting down.
"I'm fine, thanks you," Chloe said. "For someone who has ice powers, Doctor Snow was coming close to losing her cool with me."
"Well, you can be an acquired taste for some people," Kara said.
"Not sure whether to be insulted or flattered," Chloe muttered. She could see Kara sighing. Kara looked at the computer. Chloe placed her hands on the back of Kara's neck. She whispered in her ear, "So, you're pretty stressed out, aren't you?"
Kara looked towards Chloe. Chloe didn't really blink at this look directed at her from Kara. It was the second frostiest look that she had gotten all day and for that, Kara should be extremely proud because of that.
"It's just Claire and her attitude, and….the fact I seem to be hitting a stumbling block as it regards to restoring her powers," Kara said. She sighed deeply. She didn't know what to do and at this point, she felt like she was just going around in circles. "And we both know the problem regarding….."
"Yes, without the piece of gold Kryptonite, there's no way you can restore Claire's powers completely," Chloe said.
"Maybe a blood transfusion would work," Kara said. She frowned in response. "But it might be only temporary at best."
"It is only temporary at best," Lara confirmed for her. Kara turned towards her aunt and when Lara saw her niece had her full attention, she continued, "Claire's problems are caused by her skin's inability to properly transmute yellow solar radiation to channel her gifts. It's like she's being bombarded by the red sun constantly, which renders her powerless. That's just the best example I can give you."
"Okay, that's a no go," Kara said. "And about this serum?"
"It should work in theory, but there are risks and complications that I must warn you about," Lara said.
Kara frowned. There were always risks and complications regarding anything. She could feel Chloe's hands on the back of her neck, slowly rubbing it. She jolted up and Chloe paused.
"Sorry, you just seemed tense," Chloe said.
"I didn't tell you to stop," Kara said. Chloe was rather surprised, but she rolled with it. She kept massaging the back of Kara's neck. Kara closed her eyes for ten seconds to mentally return herself to the conversation. "What kind of complications?"
"There is an eighty five percent chance that it will stabilize her powers," Lara said. "She'll be able to not be dependent on the body heat."
"And the other fifteen percent?" Kara asked. She knew that she was going to regret asking this, but full disclosure and all of that.
"It may kill her," Lara informed Kara.
Kara whistled, that wasn't good odds. She thought about that for a few seconds. Knowing what she knew, she knew that Claire wouldn't have taken the chance.
It hit her that Kara was more willing to bend some rules that her cousin never dared to do so.
"If I don't give her the serum, there's a chance that she could die or become insane as well," Kara said. She felt herself backed up against the wall. She was reaching the point where she honestly had no idea what she wanted to do.
"This is pretty much damned if you do, damned if you don't, isn't it?" Chloe asked her.
"More or less," Kara agreed. She frowned and decided what she was going to do. "I'm going to need to take you back to the Kent Farm, so you can hang out there for a while. And now I'm going to track down Caitlin."
"How do you know where to look?" Chloe asked.
"Give me some credit," Kara said. "I tagged her with a tracer when I pinned her down to the ground. Barbara is keeping a close watch on it for me while I analyze the antidote."
"You're scarily prepared, you know that?" Chloe asked. She didn't know whether to find Kara amazing or scary right now.
She settled for amazingly scary. That was a nice happy medium between the two she thought.
Chloe could feel herself scooped up in Kara's arms like she was taking her over the threshold. She was sped off in the opposite direction towards the Kent Farm.
Seconds later, Kara was gone, and Chloe was looking at Martha, who was casually making dinner.
"Well, Chloe, sit down and make yourself at home," Martha said.
Chloe was almost glad that Claire wasn't here. Not that she didn't want to see her, but Chloe didn't want to explain why she was here.
Plus, she got more of her fair share of the Claire Kent angst one woman pity party of doom when she was in high school.
Caitlin rushed into Ivo's lab. She landed down onto the ground knees first and was on the verge a total breakdown.
"I can't handle this anymore, you need you change me or kill me!" Caitlin yelled. Her heart was racing.
The rush from absorbing Supergirl's body heat wore off.
"You dare come back in here in the state that you're in!" Ivo thundered. He looked at Caitlin. She looked confused. "You dare come back here, with a tracker on your body."
"What?" Caitlin asked. "I didn't know….."
One of Ivo's drones swiped the tracker off of her. Caitlin stepped back and shook her head.
"You ran into Supergirl and you should have checked yourself," Ivo said. He shook his head, almost in disappointment. "You should know anyone who hangs around a Bat that much is going to pick up a few of their bad habits!"
Ivo closed his eyes and muttered underneath his breath. It was just like he was trying to figure the best way to deal with this situation. He was trying not to lose his mind.
"If you had just attacked Miss Sullivan and froze her to send the message like you asked, none of this would have happened," Ivo said. "And after my good friend, Enigma, went to all the trouble to procure her address, this is how you handle it"
"I'm not a killer, "Caitlin said. Her heart pounded harder against her rib cage. "Maybe I should be though."
Caitlin reached forward and Ivo took a casually step back. "If you kill me now, you're done, beyond hope."
"It seems like that I'm beyond hope now," Caitlin said.
Before she could do anything, there was a smash of glass. Batgirl dropped down to the ground, perched in front of them. Wondergirl followed her, dropping down to the ground. Supergirl followed as well.
"Professor Ivo, we should have known," Batgirl said looking at the man. "So, did you build another stupid android?"
"The new and improved AMAZO is more than some stupid android, as you and your little caped friends will find out soon," Ivo said. His eyes flashed with absolute madness and one could see the pure insanity going to them. He turned towards her. "Killer Frost, take them….."
Kara took advantage of the distraction and she shot a dart right at Caitlin's neck. It stuck her in the side of her neck.
The chemical agent flowed through her body. Her fingers twitched and her body did an insane looking two step motion.
Caitlin fell back onto the ground. The dark haired woman closed her eyes, shuddering in response. Kara was up over the top of her.
She felt more normal than she did and Kara felt a pulse. She felt a sigh of relief.
Ivo was clapping slowly and casually, "Very well, very good, you stabilized her powers."
"And now it's your turn!" Supergirl yelled. Ivo raised his eyebrow.
"If you want something done right, you need to do it yourself," Ivo said. "You're about to meet your end, presenting the new and improved AMAZO!"
A robot appeared in front of them. Kara sighed when she put her hands on her hips and shook her head.
"Again, with this, really, Ivo?" Kara asked.
"Stand back, I've got this one," Barbara said. She flicked a silver disc from her belt and stuck it into the chest of the robot.
An energy pulse ruptured through the android and caused it to rock it's arms back and forth. It cycled through the powers Ivo downloaded from the hard drive.
"No, no, no, no!" Ivo bellowed.
He couldn't believe this. His android's was frozen in place and would explode with the simplest of touches and there was nothing he could do about it.
The android exploded after Kara put her fist through it, vibrating it through the core to do the rest of the damage Barbara did. The android exploded, sending oil flying everywhere that saturated the girls.
"Well, that was oddly anti-climatic," Kara said.
Donna's lips curled into an obvious pout that was obvious. She pouted, "You think that was anti-climatic? I didn't get to do anything!"
Kara patted Donna on the back of the head and that caused her frown to grow deeper. She moved over and grabbed Ivo, ripping his arm in the process.
"Android?" Barbara asked. Kara nodded. "Somehow, I knew that."
"Yes, you should have figured that out," Kara answered.
She bent down to check on Caitlin. They would have needed to get her out to some medical attention as soon as possible. She had been through a rough one she did. Thankfully, the scientist was pretty much out of the woods. Caitlin got to her feet, shivering. She felt cold and then she felt warmth.
"Don't worry, I got you," Kara said. She wrapped her arms tightly around her. "The fact you're not dead is a good sign that the antidote is working like it should."
Caitlin didn't know whether to be pleased or concerned by how blasé Kara was acting. She settled for a smile. She passed out with a weak. "Thank you"
Her head was slumped on Kara's shoulder when she escorted her out of the lab.
There were a group of doctors hovering over Caitlin and checking over her vitals, "Her vitals are normal, but she's extremely weak."
"What about her powers?" a voice asked from the side, a female.
"It's too soon to tell whether they'll return, but Supergirl has assured us that the antidote that she gave has stabilized her," the lead doctor said.
"Then we should trust her if she said so and the test collaborated," the woman in question responded.
Kara was waiting outside. She got the news of Caitlin's clean bill of health and there was honestly not much that she could do at this point. With a heavy heart, she returned back to Smallville.
She turned up at the door and saw Chloe sitting at the kitchen table, chatting with Martha.
"So, everything's okay?" Chloe asked her.
"Yes, everything's fine, she's in good hands now," Kara said. She just hoped that she didn't have any relapses. Kara had a sense what happened was a trigger to some kind of meta gene that activated when the accident occurred. "How are you doing, Martha?"
"Fine, Kara," Martha said.
"Is Claire around?" Kara asked.
"She decided to take a bit of a walk, in fact she's coming back right now," Martha said.
"Send her my regards, and tell her that I'll be back to get her this morning," Kara said. She needed to make sure Chloe was fine.
"I understand perfectly, Kara," Martha said. "It should really do her some good to have some time away from Metropolis."
Martha knew that Claire returned to the field that she was found in, to reflect. Who knew that a lot of things happened in that field that pretty much started it all.
"So, are you ready, citizen?" Kara asked.
"You've been watching too many super hero shows from 1966," Chloe said, shaking her head. She extended her arm out and Kara wrapped her arm around her.
The two of them shot off in the opposite direction and the next thing they knew, they landed outside of Chloe's apartment.
"It's been a really stressful day, couple of days," Chloe said. She looked at Kara who eyed her with a smile. "Okay, fine, it's been a really stressful couple of weeks, are you happy?"
"Not completely," Kara admitted. "But I'll accept it."
"I owe you, big time," Chloe said.
She leaned forward, ruled by some animal instinct, an impulse if you will. Her lips touched Kara's in response and Kara returned fire with an intense kiss of her own. Their tongues clashed together for the ultimate domination.
Chloe pulled back from her, and Kara held on in. "I'm….."
"Don't sweat it," Kara said. She gripped Chloe's tight ass through her pants. "You're not the first girl I've kissed."
"Donna and Barbara?" Chloe asked.
Kara grinned in confirmation, "For starters, yes."
"Looks like your starting to build your own harem," Chloe joked. Kara raised her eyebrow. "Not that's a bad thing, but….."
Kara smiled and sat down on the bed in Chloe's bedroom. She motioned for Chloe to join her. "You said that you wanted to thank me, didn't you?"
Chloe got the message loud and clear. She dropped to her knees and let instincts take her the rest of the way.
To Be Continued on 6/30/2015.
