Alex is intent on staying in the kryptonite-encased training room with Kara until the blonde falls asleep.

Or fades back into unconsciousness.

It's difficult to tell with the blonde's slurred words and circular train of thought which would come first.

Regardless, Maggie is ride or die.

Willing to stay with the Danvers sisters until the end.

No matter how messy.

But it's hard to make a conversation out of the mess that the Timborzati and kryptonite has made of her memory.

Going along with her repetitive questions until they become far and few between.

And Maggie can see how much it's tearing Alex apart.

Can see it in her eyes.

In her posture.

As Kara picks absentmindedly at the electrodes.

Draws imaginary figurines in the air.

Asks questions that she really should know the answers too.

There are only so many ways the detective can explain away the bruises and bandages.

There are only so many times of looking into those imploring cobalt eyes and pretending everything is fine.

Made even worse when the blonde, despite being stuck in a semblance of forgetfulness, seems to seems to realize that she's the reason for Alex's worry.

Seems to realize that anything she adds to the conversation just adds to the tension in the room.

Agitation and confusion marks up the pale, ashen pallor of Kara's demeanor.

The muted colors of the room coupled with the reflective, dull green emerald only sucks more liveliness out of the concentration.

She's not getting better with the kryptonite.

That much Maggie knows.

The rock is only stagnating things. Not even completely.

And of course the emerald rock brings symptoms of its own.

There's the faintest hint of a sheen of sweat beginning to form on the blonde's creased forehead.

There's the slight slur in her words, slightly blending her sentences every time she speaks.

There's the obvious weakness in muscle strength.

But it's easier to blame that all on the kryptonite, instead of the Timborzati.

Easier to believe the alternative, until Kara's conversation wavers.

And proves that the parasitic drug is still very much there.

Everyone sits up when the younger Danvers trails off abruptly.

Maggie and Alex straighten in their chairs.

She sees Winn, in the corner, who'd come in to record data off one of machines, fingers cease the typing on his notes.

They all look at her, look at her stare at something else to her left.

Maggie follows her gaze. Directly to the empty space behind them.

Nothing is there but the walls.

The empty walls.

The younger Danvers shifts uncomfortably and squints harder.

Maggie watches her tense.

Sees the goosebumps begin to pepper her skin.

The other brunette must notice as well.

And only the elder Danvers has no reluctance in asking.

"Kara, what are you looking at?"

Alex implores softly.

Kara doesn't acknowledge her initially.

Doesn't waver from her clear cut line of sight.

Winn has paused completely now at the machines.

Glancing quizzically up from his charts, eyes darting between Maggie and Alex and Kara .

The quirky tech expert opens his mouth, but doesn't say anything when the detective motions for him to let things play out.

"I…"

A forgotten explanation trails off as Kara stiffens visibly.

But it's hard to tell what Kara is even focusing on her barely lucid state.

Her knees are curled as close as she can get them against her chest and her arms are cradling her lower ribs in either and effort to alleviate the pain or to compose herself.

"Kara?"

Alex prods.

Maggie gut twists as she realizes.

This…

She was acting this way a few days earlier.

Staring sharply to her left.

Burrowing her sight into something that seemingly wasn't there.

When Alex had sent her to join the detective for company.

"Does no one hear that?"

Kara's voice is decidedly off kilter.

A significant change from before.

As if she's talking over a louder noise.

But there is no louder noise.

"What do you hear?"

Alex questions.

Leaning forward.

Inner doctor shining through.

Maggie catches a flurry of movement from the corner of her vision and she turns fully to see Winn waving silently from the machines.

Motioning at something on the screens.

The EEG.

The one that monitors neural activity in the brain.

Something has changed.

Away from the frustratingly normal activity that's dominated the screen since she arrived in the kryptonite encased room.

Now it's a smattering of high peaks and low dips.

Maggie glances back at Kara.

There seems to be no obvious visible difference.

But it's enough to cause concern.

"It's loud… Why is it so loud?"

The younger alien almost tips off the bed in her effort to locate the sound.

But Alex is already there, gently forcing her sister back down to the bed.

And as quickly as it starts it's gone.

The erratic warning beeps of the EEG stop sharply.

Levels off almost immediately.

Kara whispers something then, in response to her sister's question.

Something in a language Alex understands, but Maggie can't decipher.

Kryptonese probably.

And what she says doesn't seem to quell either of their concern any more.

"Hey, hey don't talk like that."

Kara shakes her head.

Rubs furiously at her temples.

But no amount of prodding can get Kara to say anything further.

Alex doesn't waver from Kara's side.

"I'm going to call Mom okay?"

Eliza Danvers.

The mother of the Danvers sisters.

Maggie had met Alex's mother a few times now.

Knew how she could be a steadying force when these types of things happened.

"No, no, don't call Eliza."

Kara protests weakly.

"I have too Kara, she knows about these kinds of things. She'll know what to do. She'll be worried about you too."

Winn begins gathering his notes up, to bring back to J'on and the other DEO scientists.

No doubt to pounce on the information the EEG has provided him with.

"Kar. I'm just going to call okay. It'll be quick I promise."

The elder Danvers murmurs softly, as she checks the monitors.

Checking for any more abnormalities.

"I'll be right back okay?," Alex reiterates when Kara doesn't answer the first time. "Okay?"

"Okay."

Kara murmurs softly.

"I'm not much use out there." Maggie comments quietly, as Winn and Alex leave the room. "Want me to stay until Alex comes back?"

The detective has no real intention of leaving the blonde alone in what amounts to glorified medicinal jail cell.

But she feels like she ought to give the blonde a choice anyways, considering that much of her control in this situation was rapidly being stripped away.

By both the DEO and the Timborzati.

There's a delayed reaction in Kara's response.

She's stiff on her side, still reeling from the unexpected noises.

Hands pressed forcefully against her ears, eyes scrunched tightly shut.

The detective leans forward, anticipates asking the question again. Wonders if she was even heard the first time she'd asked it.

Then the blonde turns fractionally and squints at her through glassy, narrowed eyes and nods almost imperceptibly.

"Yeah," she admits hoarsely, voice nearly a whisper, and seemingly directed into the mattress she's trying to disappear into. "Yeah, that would b-be, would be nice."

The words are stilted. Slurred. Not much different than the rest of their conversations that day.

They sit in silence for a minute.

As Kara moves her hands from her ears to curl into the twisted frays of the DEO blanket.

Curling further into herself as scrunches her eyes closer together.

"It's getting worse isn't it?"

The detective asks with as much gentleness she can muster, somehow both dreading the answer and fearing it would never come.

The blonde refuses to meet her steady gaze.

Instead, her trembling fingers twist tighter into the white cotton blanket.

Shaking like they had when Kara had visited her a few days earlier.

When the roles were reversed.

When she had been the patient and Kara the visitor.

Shaking like they had that night.

And just because the younger Danvers won't look, refuses to look, can't look up doesn't mean Maggie can't tell.

She can see the shuttered, far away heaviness in her eyes.

She can see the careful rigidness. How hard she's trying not to move.

Can hear her careful measured breaths.

How hard she's trying to prove that everything is fine externally, when Maggie knows the exact opposite is true.

Which is why she isn't surprised when the blonde murmurs shakily, unsteadily, in a whisper a breath

"A little."

A little means a lot.

And Maggie knows right then how bad has to be.

For her to admit it.

Because trying to offer comfort to the younger Danvers sister was hard.

And stubbornness seems to run in the family.

"Kara, why aren't you saying anything? We can't help you if you don't say anything."

Her voice must carry too loud because Kara winces, sinks backwards, further, albeit minutely, away from the detective, visibly trying to sink into the cot.

"I'm sorry," she whispers, lowering her voice. "But, you understand we're just trying to help."

The blonde's shuttered eyes drift towards the doors.

Towards the entrance of the kryptonite cell she can't leave.

And somewhere in the vestiges of the pain the detective senses guilt.

"I… I don't want to worry her."

She doesn't want to… what?

Maggie rapidly tries to put the pieces together from that answer.

Her is obviously Alex.

She thinks about how Kara hadn't initially gone Alex when the pain had started.

How she hadn't put up much of a fight, when her sister had coaxed her from the kryptonite room in the first place. Only two days ago.

How Alex hadn't known that Kara was even at the bar at the night.

Because Kara was supposed to have been with Mon-el that night. Supposed to have been. Wasn't.

The blonde had been secretive for a while now the detective realizes.

All for her sister's benefit.

She doesn't want to worry her.

She doesn't want to burden her.

Her kindness and her naivety would always be her weakness.

"Kara. Look at me."

Maggie slides from her chair.

Rests her on knees as she kneels in front of the hospital bed.

Kneels down in front of her.

Until she's looking directly into Kara's hollow, hooded bloodshot irises.

"Alex is your sister. She's always going to worry about you. Sick or not. It means she cares."

The younger alien grinds her teeth together as her bottom lip trembles.

And salty, silent tears fight to spring forth as the blonde averts her eyes away from the detective, back towards the DEO cot.

"They were so nice…"

Kara whispers forlornly, seemingly turning the conversation on it's side again.

But Maggie needs her to understand, needs her to understand how much everyone is worried for her in this moment.

"Kara-"

She tries to interrupt gently.

But the blonde plows forward morosely.

"They were nice, Maggie… I was sad and they bought me a drink. Only nice people do that."

The innocence in her voice is painful to hear.

She's talking about the men. The ones who drugged her.

One of whom is locked up in the bowels of the DEO facility somewhere.

Practically begging for Alex or literally any other of Kara's protective group of friends to exchange some choice words or fists.

The other still in the wind.

Though hopefully not for long.

"I-I didn't mean too… Nothing was supposed to happen. And now everything keeps on- keeps on… And now Alex is p-panicking…

She stutters over her words.

Hesitating, somehow managing to smother the inevitable hitch in her voice.

"Alex is worried."

Maggie interrupts firmly.

Kara's eyes shift to the side again, glazed with a glassy layer of tears, and Maggie watches them lose focus.

"Worried."

The younger woman echoes.

"Because she cares."

Kara smiles at that.

A small, watery version of her normal one.

The normal one she hasn't seen in some time.

"Do you think… Do you think they can turn the kryptonite level up?"

Kara sounds impossibly small. Impossibly tiny. Impossibly weak.

Asking in a breathy wheeze for the only thing that can give her permanent damage.

Too fight a parasitic alien drug that seems intent on fulfilling the exact same harm.

And Maggie begins to wonder what will happen when they can't raise the kryptonite level any more.

Wonders when they should tell Kara that the only conceivable plan they have for fighting this thing is either injecting her full of the rock that could very well kill her or leaving her alone to battle the parasite herself.

Neither option is particularly pleasant.

"I… I can ask for you."

She's hesitant to say yes.

Because even though she's in the DEO facility she has no real control of anything that happens.

She'll talk to Alex, the detective decides, when her girlfriend gets off the phone with her mother.

Hopefully with a better handle on this situation.

"Maggie… I'm scared."

The detective swallows the lump in her throat.

"It's okay to be scared."

Kara relaxes, if only minutely back into the sheets

Seemingly accepting the answer she's been forced to live with.

"Maggie?"

"Yeah, Little Danvers?"

There's a pregnant pause.

Too loud, even over the beeping of the hospital machines.

"Where's Alex?"

She doesn't answer at first.

She doesn't know how .

Denial is a horrible thing to lose.

When the strong-held belief that everything is going to be okay, when that weakens, when that fails.

She doesn't know what to do.

… …. …

Only a few more chapters left.

Just saw the episode where the Danvers had that argument about family- hurt so much.