59 Months After the Destruction of National City Pt. 2
Typical to the luck he seemed to be running that day, Flash arrived in his office before he could do anything to get rid of Bizarro. Short on time and options Lex had done the only thing he thought he could do. He sent Bizarro to The Fortress of Solitude. She had taken the advice without hesitation, her vague memories of him seemed to make her trust him implicitly, though he couldn't fully understand why. Best as he could tell, Bizarro had imprinted on him the same way that a newly born chick imprinted on its mother. It had been easy enough for him to hand Bizarro an image of The Fortress and send her out, pointing her north and telling her to keep going until she found the place.
As Lex stood in the elevator, rising from the L-Corp sub-basement to his penthouse office, he pulled up a tab on his tablet. It only took a few button presses for him to access the programs he needed. The screen blinked in front of him;
Awaiting instruction.
Lex swallowed hard. "Seek and destroy protocol."
A small green confirm flashed for a moment, then Lex locked the tablet as the lift doors opened with a ding. Flash was already in his office, sat behind his desk with his legs propped up casually. Doing his best to stay neutral, Lex stepped out of the lift and started crossing the room. Bizarro was on her way to The Fortress and once she got there, she would be taken care of. He still had to notify Supergirl, once the alarm went off that The Fortress had been breached, he would be expected to tell the Regime. Worse still, with Flash right next to him he couldn't delay at all.
"Barry," Lex smiled warmly. "How's the leg?"
"Better," The speedster answered, swinging his legs back down to the ground and getting up. "Still trying to get up to speed, so to speak."
"I can take a look at it if you want?" Lex offered, reaching his desk.
"Later." Barry tapped a few buttons on Lex's computer and the holographic display of the new prison leap into the air. "Supergirl wants this finalised today. Let's get started, we've got a lot to deal with."
Lex didn't get the chance to reply.
The warning bell tolled from the speakers built into his desk and the hologram of the prison dissolved away, replaced with an ominous red glow. Not waiting for a moment, Lex rounded his desk and began typing away at his computer. It took him a second to pull up the video footage from The Fortress of Solitude, Barry looking over his shoulder the whole time. The two of them stood for a few moments, watching the scene unfold before them. On the monitor they could clearly see Bizarro going toe to toe with Reign.
"Terrific," Lex activated the emergency broadcast. "I've located Supergirl's duplicate, it's at The Fortress of Solitude. Reign is currently engaging it."
Holt's reply was instant. "Got it, calling the boss now."
On the feed, the two watched Reign level Bizarro a vicious uppercut that sent her careening through the crystalline ceiling of The Fortress. The whole Fortress seemed to shake on the footage, the camera feed fizzling for a few moments. Reign leapt away after Bizarro, and both of them disappeared from the video.
"Where did they go?" Barry asked.
"I've lost visual," Lex addressed Holt. "They're outside The Fortress."
"I've located Reign, and the monster." It was Kara's voice coming through the feed.
Lex drew in a breath, flicking trough the external camera feeds with one finger trying to regain a visual on the fight. "How's she performing?"
"Hard to tell," Kara answered. "Are you positive she's under your control?"
"So far," Lex answered as evenly as possible. "But your presence there might confuse her."
Reign. Samantha Arias. Lex couldn't fight the guilt that weighed on him when he thought about her. She had been one of the few who hadn't wanted to take a side in the war, had wanted to just continue living her life without getting involved with the Regime or the Insurgents. Lex couldn't blame her really. He had been there when Lena had been doing everything in her power to help Sam understand what was happening to her, had been there alongside his sister and Kara trying to help. It had taken the three of them months of work, but they eventually managed to destroy the Reign personality without removing the Kryptonian DNA from Sam. After that, she had considered taking up a mantle like Kara, becoming a hero, but her heart hadn't been in it.
Then, Merlyn had happened, and National City had been vaporised. Sam had disappeared the second Supergirl had started waging her war on crime and Alex had sworn to stop her. Another Kryptonian would have swayed the battle they all knew that, and apparently so did Sam. It had taken five years for Supergirl to finally find her, and even then Sam had refused to fight. Supergirl gave her every chance to join the Regime of her own accord, at least that was what she told Lex when she dropped a sobbing Sam at L-Corp and told him to find a way to make her useful.
Mind control. Lex hated himself for doing it to Sam. A woman his sister had once considered her best friend. Every step of the way Sam had pleaded with him to stop, not to make her use her powers for the Regime. In the memory of the woman they had both loved as a sister, Sam had pleaded with Lex to stop, to let her go. He hadn't done it. It had almost killed him, but Lex found a way. Devise a collar that allowed them to control Sam almost perfectly.
She wasn't Sam anymore. Not really.
"Supergirl?" Bizarro's voice came through the feed. "We am sisters."
Lex watched Reign tackle Bizarro out of the sky, Kara sweeping back a few feet to avoid getting caught up in the attack.
"You expect me to stand here and spectate?"
"If you really want to test the efficiency of the mind control technology, stand down and let Reign do what she was instructed to do."
There was a pregnant pause. "Fine."
Lex let out a sigh of relief. If Supergirl got involved there was a chance she could stop Reign before she could eliminate Bizarro.
"You're seriously controlling Reign from here?" Barry asked, disdain heavy in his voice.
Lex couldn't blame him. Barry had always been Supergirl's most vocal critic within her own camp, and Lex had never disagreed with anything the Speedster had said, even if he never had openly back Barry.
"Thus far."
"Then I'm glad we're over here." Barry crossed his arms.
"Lex, I need to be clear on one thing," Supergirl's voice came over the comms again. "I want to find out where the monster came from. I need her alive."
Lex sighed. "Understood."
The program was holding strong. All the readouts compiling on Lex's computer told him that Reign was fighting at full capacity. She seemed capable of distinguishing between objectives. Despite his concerns she could differentiate between Supergirl and Bizarro even though they looked almost identical. But somehow, Reign was losing.
"The imposter has the upper hand, I'm stepping in." Supergirl announced.
With a few keystrokes Lex transferred the main video footage from outside The Fortress onto the monitors that took up most of the space on the wall adjacent to his desk. He and Barry watched as Supergirl swept in and smashed her fist into Bizarro's chin.
For the briefest of moments, Lex could see Supergirl and Bizarro right next to each other. In the strangest way, it gave him an obscene amount of perspective on how much had changed the last five years. Bizarro wore Supergirl's original costume; bright red and blue, thigh high boots and a skirt, crest of the House of El modestly displayed. She had changed so much. The bulk of her uniform was a deep navy blue, skirt swapped out for pants, the crest now took up almost her whole chest, emblem stretching down into a point the joined the red of her belt. Compared to her former self, Kara truly did look more High Counsellor than Supergirl.
The feed from Reign's bodycam flashed up in front of him. Bizarro was on the ground a few dozen meters away, Supergirl stood in front of Reign, back turned. Barry wasn't looking at Lex, his focus on the camera feeds displayed on the various external monitors. Lex's attention drifted down to Reign's program. He knew what his options were. He could end Kara's rule right there. With a shaky hand, Lex changed Reign's targeting parameters to all.
"Reign just attacked Kara!" Holt's voice jumped onto the comms. "What's going on, Lex?"
Lex steeled himself. "I told Kara not to insert herself into the fight. Reign must be confused."
"Supergirl hit me?!" Bizarro bellowed. "Me hit Supergirl!"
On the video feed, Lex and Barry watched as both Reign and Bizarro attacked Supergirl. In a few moments, she was down on her back, the two other Kryptonians beat her down with blow after blow.
"I thought you had her under control?" Barry rounded on Lex. "They're both attacking Kara!"
"Like I told Kara…" Doing everything in his power to keep himself steady, Lex answered. "Reign is confused. Two foes who look the same."
"I can't watch this. I've got to do something." Barry disappeared in a blur of lightning.
Lex sat back in his chair. All he had to do was nothing.
"Hang in there, Kara," Holt's voice came through the comms. "Back up is on the way."
For a whole minute, Lex sat in silence watching Kara take hit after hit. She could hardly get to her feet. Every time she tried, she was beaten back to the floor. Lex could see the blood trickling from her nose via Reign's bodycam, the tears in her uniform, the cuts on her face. They would kill her before Barry got there.
"I can't," Lex spoke to himself, pulling up Reign's targeting parameters again. "Not like this. I'm no murderer."
Barry arrived and swept Kara away in a yellow haze, just as Lex swapped Reign's focus back to Bizarro.
"Reign is back online." Lex addressed the group via his comms. "How's Kara?"
"She'll live." Barry replied.
Lex turned his focus back to Reign's bodycam. With Kara out of the way and Bizarro distracted by the sudden appearance of Flash, Reign easily gained the upper hand. She had her arms wrapped around Bizarro's head, twisting with inhuman force. Through Reign's feed, he could hear Bizarro.
"Ow-ow-ow…" Bizarro was practically weeping. "Hurts…hurts…much…"
The cries were cut of by a resounding krk-krk-krunch.
Lex let out a breath he didn't know he was holding. Bizarro was dealt with.