Title: Into the Fray, Unflinching
Author: gldngr7
Rating: Explicit
Began: April 21, 2017
Chapters: ?
Feedback: Encouragement and constructive criticisms are always welcome. Flames are destroyed with my freeze breath.
Author's Notes:
Chapter 24/?At first it seems nothing has changed. Until she realizes that everything is backwards, as though they've been dropped into a mirror world. The projector, which was behind them is now in front of them, and the control console is now a few feet to their rear, and Kal is no longer standing there.
A haunted feeling permeates the place, the silence echoing loudly off its walls, unlike the Fortress of Solitude which feels alive and vibrant by comparison, despite its name.
Alex takes less time than the others to accept the change in their surroundings. "We're not in Kansas anymore," she reminds them, unwinding her watch from her wrist just as Kal had instructed.
"I thought we were in the Arctic," Mon-El counters, brow wrinkling with confusion.
"No," Alex chuckles, humored by Mon-El's unintentional ignorance. "We were…it's just a reference to 'The Wonderful Wizard of Oz'," she explains. "Which seems more than apt, at the moment. It's a book about a girl who gets swept up by a tornado that takes her to a magical land where all the animals can talk." She sets her watch on the edge of the control console and announces its readings as if shooting the starting pistol heard at the beginning of a marathon. "March 13th," she says. "10:42 a.m., National City time."
"Oh," Mon-El perks up, remembering something from his allowed reading list. "The one with the white rabbit who's always late."
Alex's smile turns into a laugh. "That's 'Alice in Wonderland'," she corrects.
"There's another one?"
"I guess I didn't realize it…but Earth has a few stories about girls getting swept up into magical lands," Alex muses.
"Wendy Darling," Kara adds, only half listening to their conversation while she catalogues their surroundings. Moving over to the console, she takes note that there are no buttons or levers, like the console in the Fortress – only the outline of a handprint and one line of instruction written in the block script of Kryptonian. "This doorway remains closed to all but those who carry blood from the House of El."
"Peter Pan," Alex tells Mon-El. "Wendy, along with her two brothers, gets taken to Neverland, where no one ages."
"Just like the Phantom Zone," he connects. He turns to ask her more, but before he can ask about this story and how it all ends for this Wendy Darling, a piercing sound rips through his ears, stealing his breath and driving him to one knee.
Beside him, Alex too drops to floor, her hands covering her ears, her entire body curling into a fetal position in an attempt to shield herself from the onslaught of sound. It's unlike anything she's ever heard before, impossible to describe except to say that it feels like two incompatible sounds coming in vicious contact, grinding together as through hoping to cancel each other out, but managing to do the exact opposite. "Turn it off," she screams, unable to hear her own voice over the raucous noise.
He can feel it in his gut, the way some noises spark visceral emotion and turn a person's body against oneself. His teeth clash together, his back bows and arches as the sound races down his spine, promising to split him in two.
"What is it?" Kara asks, unable to see or hear what's causing them such distress. Only the sounds of their pain are audible to her.
"I can't…I can't…." Mon-El begs, his hands curling into claws as though someone else is pulling the strings.
She recalls Kal's warning that only members of the House of El are welcome in this place, and that for all others, this place would be hostile. Spinning about, Kara searches for the rotunda's exit and wasting little time on her choice, lifts Alex into her arms and speeds her to the exit, dropping her just outside before heading back for Mon-El.
The moment Kara crosses the threshold, the torture ceases, leaving Alex a lump on the ground, relief washing through every cell in her body. Kara deposits Mon-El on the ground beside her before whipping off her knapsack and digging into it.
"Water?" Kara inquires, offering Alex a sip of cool liquid. She hadn't realized how dry her mouth was. How dry every part of her was, as if the security measures in place at the entry had literally been sucking the life out of her…out of both of them.
Luckily, they recover quickly once they're no longer under attack.
"Your cousin wasn't kidding about this place hating people who aren't of El bloodlines," Mon-El says, screwing the lid back on his now mostly empty bottle of water. "Are you sure it doesn't have a special hate for Daxamites?" he chuckles to lighten the mood.
"Trust me," Alex responds, nodding at Mon-El, "I'm pretty sure it hated me with the same level of viciousness. As far as security systems go, it's pretty effective."
"Are you going to be okay?" Kara asks them both, her brow wrinkling, and her blue eyes filled with concern.
"I'm okay," Alex reassures her. "I just need a few minutes to get my equilibrium back."
"If she feels anything like I do…she means that literally," Mon-El chimes in, cupping one ear with the palm of his hand.
"Will you two be okay while I go back in for your things?"
"I'm sure we'll be fine," Alex displays her usual bravado. She isn't one for being babied or being treated as breakable. In some ways, she's every bit as invulnerable as her adoptive Kryptonian sister, or at least she acts like it most of the time.
Back inside The Partition, she takes a moment to look around. The now tell-tale giveaway that she is no longer in the Fortress of Solitude's main chamber is the change in the console and aged appearance of the crystal walls around her. Kal had reminded her that this place was separate from the Phantom Zone, a pocket universe within a pocket universe, where time moves normally but space is fluid, allowing it to move locations within the Phantom Zone as required.
Behind a waist-high cropping of crystal beams, Kara stumbles onto a pile of Kryptonian skeletons. Four in all, huddled close together, their bodies still wearing the tattered remains of a mode of dress already outdated at the time of Krypton's destruction. They were connected to each other, curled into each other, skeletal fingers intertwined, or arms wrapped around each other. Very little of the clothing remains, but the heavy patches with their family sigils survive. None of them are Els.
"Why did you come here?" she wonders aloud, as if expecting the skeletons to reply. "You must have known it wasn't safe for you. Why didn't you leave when the security measures kicked in?" Kara's eyes widen as the answer occurs to her a second later. It's almost as if their ghosts reside in this place, whispering their answers into her ear. "Oh," she sighs, her face drooping sadly. They lost hope. They made a pact and they saw it through despite the pain and what must have been overwhelming fear.
She tries not to put too much consideration into what crimes sent them to this place, since it's a question unlikely to be resolved now.
"Maybe Rao's light embrace you," she whispers. "May your punishment pay the price for His forgiveness." With a sense of reluctance, she pulls away from them, leaving them to their peace and hoping beyond hope that Rao has heard her prayer.
She searches the remainder of the gateway, but thankfully finds nothing.
Kara grabs the two backpacks Alex and Mon-El set down when they arrived through the projector, when they thought they might have a few moments to recover from having their bodies deconstructed on a molecular level and then transported to another dimension.
"Kara!" she hears Alex's voice bellow from outside, something odd and unrecognizable in her sister's tone. Fear, maybe? It isn't a sound that sits well with her. "You better come see this!"
"I'm coming," she shouts in response, settling one backpack on her shoulder while carrying the other in her free hand.
Outside, she doesn't find Alex and Mon-El in the threshold where she left them, but several meters away, having ventured past the enclosed outer vestibule sheltering, or perhaps hiding, the entrance from unwanted visitors. Frustratingly, as she walks further from the gateway, her feet grow heavier and sink into the ground beneath her. Looking down, she sees that the surface is no longer the diamond-hard crystal like in the Gateway, but instead a fine, dark sand, like the black beaches formed from the volcanoes of Hawaii. Kara notices a wall of the same sand before them and a seeming line of demarcation at their feet where the environment changes. The Partition must come with its own dome of environmental protection wherever it travels. Inside the dome, their surroundings are serene and peaceful, outside it appears they've landed in the midst of an eternal dark sandstorm.
When she reaches them, she looks up to see what has enthralled them to the point of near hypnotism, only to be instantly caught in the spell which has ensorcelled her companions.
"That can't be real," she manages to finally verbalize, shaking her head to free herself from the vista's entrancement. She could have been mesmerized for a minute or for 1000 years – there's just no way to tell.
"It certainly seems to defy all expectations," Alex agrees, her mouth agape. She takes her knapsack from Kara and opens the front outside pocket, removing the goggles she packed and wastes no time sliding them in place in preparation for diving into the waiting storm. Despite the draw of scientific questions all around here, Alex manages to stay focused on the mission. All business.
After donning her protective eyewear, she withdraws three 2-way radios from her back, flicks the power switch on two of them and hands one to Kara. Holding one to her mouth, she depresses the send button and says, "Testing one…two…three. Please respond."
Kara's walkie-talkie remains silent, a steady unbroken hiss of white noise its only response.
She waits a moment and tries again. "Testing one…two…three. Please respond," she repeats, only to be met with the same flat, white noise. "Well…these don't work," Alex decides, flipping the radio off and dropping it back in her pack, along with the one reserved for Mon-El.
"How did you end up here when you were in the pod?" Mon-El asks Kara, both only peripherally aware of Alex's failed radio-check. Taking his lead from Alex, he retrieves his own goggles and slides them in place over the hood of his jacket, rationalizing that the goggle strap will keep the hood in place no matter what they come up against. Before Kara can answer his question, he also asks, "How did you escape from this place?"
"I have no idea," she replies with a shrug, tucking the slim radio into her jacket pocket. "Since I was in stasis the whole time. I don't remember being here…at all." Because this place was certainly not one she would ever forget. It would have been burned into her memory. No amount of description from Kal could possibly have prepared her for the world in which the projector deposited them.
No…the Phantom Zone is more than just world, it's a universe all to its own, and it doesn't seem to follow recognizable rules. It's as if Rao, in a fit of creative experimentation, peeled the skin from every planet in a solar system, sewed them all together, and then turned the resulting product inside out. Then…if that wasn't enough, He dropped a singularity in the center of it all and set a red sun swirling around its accretion disk, but seemingly safe from getting sucked inside.
While Kara stares, mesmerized at the world around them, Alex plays the older sister by removing Kara's goggles from her backpack and helping her don them, leaving them perched on Kara's forehead so that they don't obscure her vision. "Now I know why time doesn't move here," Alex posits after completing her task. "Time dilation…thanks to that," she points at the black hole. "The closer we are to the singularity; the slower time moves relative to the outside world."
"There is no outside world," Mon-El points out, spinning around for a panoramic view of the entire universe.
"Well, Kal hasn't shown up…so that's a good sign," Kara says, hopefully. In the 'sky' above them, no matter where she looks, she witnesses pinpricks of light crackle with energy and then grow in the distance, while others still seem to sputter and then wink out of existence, like stars dying right before her eyes. They're the only thing she's seen so far that seem to operate in real time.
Looking directly above her head, Alex sees not a sky as she would on any other planet, but an upside-down mountain range, miles above their heads. In another direction she sees a large ocean of deep magenta waters, a collection of massive storms spread throughout, their cyclone shaped clouds frozen in time. Behind her, the environment is obscured by a thick layer of sand clouds kicked up by motionless funnels. Walking in any direction will take them someplace different, and perhaps someplace for which they are unprepared, like a desert land rife with unmoving sandstorms. Notably absent is the presence of any environment where one might take a relaxing vacation.
"This can't be real," Alex exclaims, shaking her head.
"Oh, it's very real," a gravelly voice interrupts, sending a chill racing up Kara's spine.
In unison, the three of them spin in the direction of the voice and find a man who clearly takes his status as an alpha to an insurmountable height. He wears the Kryptonian garb of a member of the Military Guild, but it's been supplemented by an inelegantly shaped armor; a chest plate, helmet, and greaves strapped to his arms and legs. Unhealed wounds litter his body, including an open gash peeking out from beneath his helmet, likely the collective impetus for the creation of the armor. In his hands he grasps a crudely serrated weapon that could only charitably be called a sword, though clearly its artless appearance makes it, in actuality, no less deadly.
He removes a worn scarf from his face, placed there not only to obscure his features, but to protect them from the sand-laced air outside of the invisible bubble of The Partition. He looks like he came straight out of Central Casting for a 'Mad Max' movie and he stands just inside the dome, which means it doesn't keep people in…or out.
From out of the sand wall steps two more warriors, flanking their leader.
"Welcome to The Phantom Zone," the alpha says, though his tone carries not a hint of welcome in it. He points his sword at them. "Now which one of you is the El?"
Kara's heart drops into the pit of her stomach. This is going to get ugly. "What do we do?" she whispers, wishing that she'd taken a moment, like her sister, to hide her face behind a protective bandana.
Alex, who's always had a mind for strategy and a willingness to make the tough calls has already sized up the situation and come to one conclusion. "We make a run for it."
"Run?" Kara hisses, taken aback by her warrior-sister's suggestion. As Supergirl, she isn't one to back down.
"Stay on mission. We came here for a purpose," Alex reminds Kara. Her voice is muffled by the scarf she's placed around the lower half of her face, covering her nose and mouth. "If they take us out now, we'll have failed."
"So…live to fight another day? That's your suggestion?"
"It's a solid strategy. With a little luck we can lose them in the storm and if Cisco's calculations were correct then Trel and Gata should be around here somewhere, we just need to find them. They're probably hiding from this lot."
Mon-El nods his head in agreement, unobtrusively so as to not alert the inmates as to their private conversation. "They either want revenge or they want out – and they have us at a disadvantage. Either way, they're likely to be waiting here for us when we return. We can take them by surprise when we do. It's a chance to turn the tables."
"Now that sounds like a plan." Alex situates her knapsack more solidly on her back, while unobtrusively fingering the retractable baton tucked into her belt, just in case.
The warlord's eyes rake over the newly arrived party, taking their measure of Alex and then lingering on Mon-El. His eyes transform to hard, black chips of anger, sparking with confused recognition as the muscles in his jaw tick with barely-leashed tension. Disregarding his own questions, his glare then settles on her, his black eyes meeting her striking blue. Eyes that would be immediately recognizable to anyone who had had ever met either Jor-El or his brother Zor. The corner of his mouth lifts, having found what he sought. Disregarding Alex as a threat, the warlord then focuses in on Mon-El, the only man among them, as someone with whom he must quickly dispense. He reckons he can use the smaller female for leverage to then get what he needs. The darkness of his thoughts are so easily discerned on his face, like a bold subway advertisement forcing itself upon the reader.
"You're going to get me home," he insists, pointing his sword at Kara. "And if you don't do it willingly…well I'm told all I need is a little blood on my hands."
The man on his right chuckles, menacingly. "We don't mind a little blood on our hands."
"That's our cue," Alex says. In unison, the three of them spin and make a run for it, right into thick, stagnant wall of black sand into Rao-knows-where. Kara fumbles to pull her goggles over her eyes as she runs headlong into the immobile wall of storm.
They run and run, trying to keep each other in sight – though the mist of sand makes it difficult – staying tuned to the shouting and cursing of the warriors behind them. Kara trips on something and stumbles, crying out, but Mon-El is there to right her and pull her along.
A sharp pain in her chest steals her breath, and then another in her gut like she's being stabbed. Her heart pounds and pounds as though trying to beat its way through her sternum. She heaves and heaves but can't get enough air into her lungs, because the air itself is too thick to breathe, the fine sand gathering in her nostrils and in the back of the throat. Suddenly, Alex and Mon-El are both taking an arm and placing one over each of their shoulders, dragging her along, her feet barely touching the ground.
"Someone skipped Cardio," Alex jokes, barely even breaking a sweat.
They stop long enough for Alex to place a wad of linen, a crumpled scarf, over Kara's mouth and nose, allowing her to breathe air now filtered by the cloth. Unwilling to be the one responsible for getting their group caught, Kara nods at her sister indicating her readiness to move on. She accepts Mon-El's assistance, as she coughs into the makeshift filter she holds over her nose and mouth.
Further away from The Partition, the storm clears up a bit – a bit – affording them a better look at their surroundings. A canyon of cliffs rises above them, reaching into the sky – or it would, if there were one. Instead, it reaches into the inverted rain forest above them. Winding down through the seemingly impassable canyon is an unmoving river, white rapids frozen in time like a disturbingly real painting.
Far too high to scale, the cliffs offer no hope for escape, nor will the river sweep them away from danger. Behind them, voices call out and taunt them, gaining on their position as Kara catches her breath. She takes a moment to tie the kerchief around her face like the others have done.
Can't turn back, and no immediately visible way forward. "We're inside a damn hamster ball," Alex laments, eyes casting about for an escape.
"Upriver," Mon-El suggests, pointing towards the out cropping of rocks that line the river. "Perhaps we can find someplace to hide."
"How are you…still breathing…?" Kara gasps, lungs laboring for nourishment.
"I've burned up three treadmills since arriving on Earth," he shrugs, trying to keep the mood light. "Unlike some people…I don't rest on my Kryptonian laurels. It takes a lot of energy to outrun your demons."
Alex tugs her along, following Mon-El's suggestion but warning, "It's the obvious route. We can't stay on it for long."
Kara struggles as the incline of their route seems to grow sharper with each step. Perhaps, if they can reach the zenith of the river, they'll summit the cliffs and take the high ground, getting a better view of the rocky valley below.
Still, their pursuers gain on them with each step, their voices sounding frighteningly near, the mist that before muffled their shouting voices, growing thinner as they climb upriver. Suddenly Mon-El maneuvers them to an outcropping of rock, boulders that must have once separated from the cliffs above, then tumbled down slower than the eye could perceive, eventually landing beside the river eons later.
Huddled together in their hiding place, Alex places a finger over her lips and listens for their pursuers. Just as they have stopped, so have the predators, checking the ground for signs of direction. It sounds as if the prisoners are ready to give up and head back to The Partition, and Alex breathes a sigh of relief. That is, until she hears an ill-timed crackle of static.
"Testing one…two…three. Please respond."
Inside Kara's jacket, her 2-way radio flares to life, finally receiving the message Alex sent upon their arrival, some half an hour ago now by Alex's best estimate. Her voice is distorted and drawn out, as if the walkie-talkie's batteries are on their last legs.
"Grife," Mon-El hisses quietly.
Panicked, Kara fumbles for the radio in her jacket, simultaneously searching for the power button, the way one might when their cell phone rings in a work meeting, or at the cinema.
"No wait," he whispers, taking the radio from her grasp. Quickly, Mon-El turns the volume button to the maximum setting and then heaves the radio across the river with all his might, hoping it doesn't break upon landing. Another moment later, the silence is broken once more by Alex's repeat performance of the radio check in the distance.
"Testing one…two…three. Please respond," the garbled voice travels through the mist. Fingers crossed, the trio each hopes the radio is enough to convince their pursuers that they were making a bid for the other side. At least long enough for them to get some distance.
"Quick thinking," Alex approves in a whisper.
"Thanks." Due to Mon-El's gambit, the leader of the pack takes the bait, if only briefly. A hundred yards away through the mist, they observe as the three figures, barely more than humanoid-shaped shadows search the mists for their quarry, but find nothing.
"Check the other side!" the leader shouts, violently shoving one of his minions into the water.
"There's only two of them now," Alex rasps a moment later, listening as the swimmer climbs up onto the opposite bank. "We could take them."
"I wouldn't recommend that," joins a new voice from behind. In shocked unison, Kara, Alex and Mon-El spin around, all now wedging the large boulder against their backs, which were disturbingly unprotected just a moment before when the interloper snuck up on them.
He stands before them, apparently unconcerned by any shadow he might cast. His garb is a cloak of Kryptonian design, long ago worn amongst the lower ranking members of the Law Guild. Once a light blue, but now dark with filth, it is threadbare and raggedy, shredded through in more than a few places, with what appears to be the sigil from the House of Tor stitched over the right breast. The cloak's hood, pulled down low to protect his face from the detritus hanging in the air, veils all but the lower part of his mouth and chin, which itself is hidden by a thick chestnut brown scruff. Clasped on both hands is a gnarled staff which he holds across his body, ready to strike, but not – Kara thinks – at them. "Kol-Mer is a brutal killer who will happily flay the muscle from your bones then eat it right in front of you. But, thanks be to Rao, he's dumb as rocks."
There's something off about the way the man speaks, out of one side of his mouth. Kara cringes when his head turns, revealing a glimpse of the reason why as he turns away from them. One cheek bears an open gash that has split the corner of his lips on one side, leaving only half of his mouth in proper working order. Crude stitches have been placed to hold the man's face together. The unhealed wound travels from the split of his lip an undetermined length up his cheek and beneath the cover of the hood he clearly uses to hide the damage.
"Come with me…if you want to live." Beckoning with one hand, the man turns and walks away, fully expecting them to follow.
"Did he just 'Terminator' us?" Alex asks, incredulously.
"I'm guessing that's an Earth pop-culture reference I don't know anything about." Mon-El's face concealed by both goggles and a kerchief, his confusion is evident only in the tone of his voice.
"Lots of guns and explosions," Kara nods, leveraging herself to her feet. "I'll put it on your watch list."
"Wait, are you sure?" Mon-El grabs her arms, to keep her from following the mysterious savior.
"Trel Gand is supposed to be around here somewhere," she points out. Kara follows the cloaked figure before she can slip away in the mist, forcing Mon-El and Alex to accompany her or risk losing sight of her as well. "Perhaps this man can lead us to him."
"This seems like a frying pan-fire situation," Alex grumbles.
Without taking her eyes from the hooded figure moving through the mist ahead of her, Kara hears Alex's baton extending. As usual, her sister isn't a big fan of risks, and she's not quick to trust. In the interest of making sure Kara is safe, Mon-El does the same; but Kara leaves her baton clipped to her waistband. She prefers to first try to make an ally here, before condemning their savior to the role of enemy.
"Just be…careful," he advises Kara in a low voice.
Quietly, they follow the figure from a healthy distance behind, as he uses the staff in his hand to help him negotiate the steeper parts of the incline. There's something about him that she…trusts. An instinct she can't explain. A weariness, a slope to his cloaked shoulders, a shuffle to his steps that suggests he's no longer in this for the fight, assuming he ever was. Up ahead, he disappears behind an enormous gray slab of slate rock and Kara is forced to speed her labored pace to get him back into her line of sight again. But she nearly plows right into him as she turns the corner around the boulder.
Behind the slab of stone there is a large triangular gash in the cliff face, invisible to the casual observer or aimless wanderer, perfectly hidden by the conveniently positioned shield of slate.
"A cave," Alex supplies from behind. Her sigh of relief is palpable, contagious, and heard by all.
"It's safe here," the gravelly voice confirms, though he doesn't turn around. He wants to say more, Kara senses, but presses his lips together. With the damage to his mouth, too much speaking must be an agony. He must have used up his daily currency of pain tolerance in convincing them to follow him. Dipping his head, the man beckons them once more with his staff before walking into the cave.
"Creepy mist all around? Mysterious cloaked figure? Dark cave? What could possibly go wrong?" Mon-El shrugs, before throwing caution to the wind and venturing into the darkness. Kara turns her head, eyes meeting Alex's before, together, they wordlessly agree with Mon-El's assessment. The circumstances were, far and away, less than ideal, but they also had little choice.
Expecting darkness to envelop them as they enter the fissure, they're surprised to discover the dim glow of firelight beyond the cave's entrance. Held in the robed figures hand is a torch that lights their way. Oddly, the flame has no flicker visible to the naked eye, just a static and dim sort of life – the mere remnant of a fire.
"How is that possible?" Alex wonders in awe, unable to take her eyes from the static flame.
He tilts his head in her direction and lowers his arm, offering her a better view of the torch. "Combustion…still possible…in the right conditions," the man explains. Even without seeing his face, Alex can hear the sound of approaching fatalism in his voice. "But…fleeting, like…hope."
Alex's hand reaches tentatively for the flame, testing it for its heat. Perhaps foolhardy, she might have theorized that the lack of flicker to the flame might also equal a lack of heat. Hissing, she yanks her hand back when the torch proves her wrong.
He shakes his head, the good side of his mouth smirking, as if silently questioning Alex's intelligence. "Come," he instructs. "We shouldn't stay here," he says, pointing at the entrance.
Deeper into the cave there's a corridor of sorts, a suffocating gauntlet with damp walls, where the slow drip of groundwaters carved its way through the solid stone of these caverns. It must have taken eons beyond measure, considering the speed at which this place moves.
The encroaching darkness of the corridor forces them to remove their goggles to let in what little light the faint torch provides. It's a good thing none of them are claustrophobic, since the width of the passage varies as they walk in single file, Kara behind the man, Mon-El at her back and Alex bringing up the rear, her baton at the ready should they be attacked from behind. Throughout the long corridor, the man points out traps for them to avoid – traps designed to both warn of intruders, as well as maim and kill any who might encroach upon their destination. Finally, after what seemed like the length of a football field, the passage opens up into a cavernous grotto.
Mon-El pulls her back before she can enter the cavernous room. "I'll stay here," he informs her, lowering the bandana to his chin to be better understood. "Keep watch for intruders. Be careful."
Kara nods and shares a look of agreement with Alex before turning back to follow the man into the grotto. Several meters above their heads, hang stalactites, and from the ground spring stalagmites, both the result of millions of years of sediment-heavy groundwater dripping from ceiling. Dozens of teardrops of water hang suspended in the air, the various stages of their journey to the ground still ongoing, but frozen to the naked eye. Overwhelmed by her curiosity, Alex catches a water droplet in her hand and spreads it across her palm. It feels like getting a glimpse of what it must be like for Kara when she uses her super speed.
She unties the bandana from her face and wipes it through the air until it's soaked with water, and then wipes the grit and sand from her face with it. Afterwards, she repeats the process and hands the kerchief to Kara to do the same, pointing out the dark silt around her sister's nostrils where Kara breathed in too much of the muck.
In the center of the grotto lies a spring, torches of static flames stuck into the ground all around to light the chamber. A campfire in the corner of the chamber marks the place where the man sleeps, a bed of dried grasses, rags and animal furs to soften the hard ground of the cavern floor. Around the fire, there are pots made of clay, rudimentary earthenware for eating and cooking, a knife made of flint and a spoon carved of wood.
He's been here a long time; that much is clear by the items he's gathered to make the place livable. The determination it must have taken to light the fires, as well as set the traps designed to keep others out, fills Alex with awe. She can't help but wonder what crime this Kryptonian must have committed to end up in this place, or if his sentence might have already ended if not for the destruction of his homeworld.
"Rao provides all in this place, if you but pay the price of labor," he says. It's a chant – a mantra – one he's clearly practiced for ages. An idea that's kept him sane during his darkest times.
His pain is great, bowing him at the shoulders, but long ago he made it a part of him, and now he can choose to forget the weight of it when there are questions to ask and answers to obtain. "It's been…ages since anyone…was sentenced to this place," he announces, filling a pitcher with water from the spring. His speech is stilted, every few words pausing only to then ramp himself up to speak again. It gives the impression of stutterer speaking, but without the stutter. As a consequence, his words seem well chosen and diplomatic.
"We weren't sentenced," Kara says, answering the unasked but obvious question.
"Did you…come to…parole?"
From a clay pitcher, he pours a cup of something, handing it to her to drink. He does this with great reverence, and something inside of her understands that this is the greatest hospitality that he has to offer them. Thirstier than she can ever remember being, she doesn't hesitate to take a gulp, glad that it's merely water, though lukewarm. Wordless, she passes the cup to her sister who takes a drink and empties it.
He fills the cup again and hands it to Alex, nodding in the direction of the cave's entrance, where Mon-El blocks the passage, listening for intruders. Alex thanks him for the cup and with a silent beseeching for Kara to be cautious, leaves to take Mon-El the sustenance. With a glance they agree that neither will tell their host of the bottles of water safely ensconced in their packs, just yet. A wealth of riches they might appear to him, and feel his incalculable hospitality cheapened in the comparison.
"Krypton is gone," Kara informs him, sadly. "Destroyed decades ago, when the planet's core exploded. There's no home for the prisoners to go back to."
His bowed head jerks up. "Gone?"
"I'm sorry to have to tell you."
The man sinks to the ground beside the fire, his hands shaking slightly. "Then…how…are you here?" he wonders, setting aside the pitcher.
"The 'how' is a long story and less important than the 'why'. We came in search of someone. A man named Trel Gand. Perhaps you've heard of him? He should be nearby since the projector was calibrated to put us in the vicinity," Kara continues, unaware that the man seated at the fire reaches into his cloak.
Despite his earlier shuffling pace, the man now moves like a wraith, gaining his feet faster than her leaden body can now react. A crude stone blade he'd kept hidden in his cloak now rests against the soft, vulnerable flesh of her neck. As though he had been nothing more than a figment of her imagination, gone is the hospitable man that stood before her only a moment before.
"Who are you?" he demands through gritted teeth. "Did they send you?" The stone blade pricks her flesh in warning and though her own insides are strangely, eerily calm, she can sense panic overwhelming him as if she feels it herself. Kara knows that he isn't thinking clearly and can't imagine that ending well for her. With a flick of his head, the hood of cloak falls back to fully reveal his face, shockingly silver eyes searching hers for truth. "Does Kallas Max send you to finish the job?"
"Oh my God!" Kara breathes, her eyes widening. It's impossible not to notice the gash that travels from his torn mouth all the way up to his temple, skirting near enough to his eye to not damage it, but just past it, as though the weapon had decided to be merciful. But it's not the hideous wound traveling up his face that's the source of her shock – she's seen horrors like this before – it's the other side of his face that takes her breath away. The pristine half. In quick succession, the pieces fall into place. "You're him."
The next instant, there's a blur of bodies as Mon-El comes between them, his body block sending the prince tumbling to the ground, his flint blade flying out of his hands and shattering against the cave wall. Unaware of what had just transpired, only that the man had a knife to Kara's throat with what appeared to be intent to do harm, Mon-El had sprung into action without a thought or a plan, ready to pummel Kara's attacker into dust. Looking down at the prince, curling up to protect himself, Mon-El sees nothing but red and raises his fist to prepare a merciless blow.
"Mon-El, stop!" Kara shouts, before he can strike. Mon-El freezes in place, only her voice reaching through the din of rage that clamors within. She pulls her mate away, leaving the prince on the ground to gather what pieces of him remain. "It's him."
"He tried to hurt you," Mon-El fumes. "And without your powers…."
"Without my powers I would have bled out at glacial speeds, just like everyone else here," she points out, logically. "And then healed as soon as we made it back to The Partition. I'm fine. He was scared, that's all," she justifies. "Afraid that we'd been sent to kill him."
"That's no excuse!"
"Calm down, Mon-El." She places her hands on his chest, soothing the heart racing beneath his rib cage. "Breathe. I'm okay. I would have been okay. Even without my powers I know how to fight. I learned from the best, and by that, I mean Alex. Plus…the guy's not exactly in tip top shape," Kara points out, watching as Alex gingerly approaches the prince to offer her assistance. Her sister rummages through her knapsack searching for something that might help. "The truth is…I was afraid I would hurt him, and I didn't want to lose his trust completely."
"I'm sorry, I know I shouldn't assume…."
"It's okay…forgotten," she whispers, offering her forgiveness. "What's more important is that we found him."
"What?" he asks, confused. "Found whom?"
"The prince," she answers, pointing at the man to whom her sister now tends.
"We found him?"
"Yes."
"How can you be sure it's him? What did you tell him about our mission?"
"It's him," she answers, her confidence absolute.
"But how can you be sure it's not some ruse he's invented to escape with us? We have to be certain, Kara."
Kara smiles, slipping her arm through his and leading him closer to fire. Far enough to seem unthreatening, but close enough for a good view of the man on the ground. "Look," she whispers, urging Mon-El to really see the man for the first time. "Don't you see? It's him!"
Taken aback by the sight of the other man's face, Mon-El lowers the hood of his jacket and crouches down in front of Daxam's last great ruler. Prince Trel looks up at Mon-El and their eyes meet, the exact same shade of silver, fear encountering intense curiosity.
"Who are you?" Trel inquires, almost begging.
Something tears loose in Mon-El's chest, a weight he's carried for what feels like an eternity now – for so long he can barely recall what it feels like to be without it. The smothering fear that, for better or worse, fueled his decisions and haunted his nightmares since learning the circumstances of his birth, turns to ash inside of him and floats away like the nothingness it becomes.
"I am Mon-El," he answers, dropping down to his knees before the man whose eyes still brim with fear, "formerly the Prince of Daxam, and we came to get you out of this gods-forsaken place."
Trel shakes his head, dispelling these obvious delusions of hope. They aren't the first hallucinations he's seen in this place, and likely not the last. But still, he's been alone so long, to ask himself not to interact would be asking too much. "How long?" Trel wonders. "How long has it been?"
Mon-El estimates the length of time, a prospect made more difficult by the fact that their world stopped revolving around a sun some time ago. Plus, he must translate the last 30 years of Earth time into Daxam time. "One hundred and thirty-seven revs," he replies, referring to the number of revolutions Daxam had made (and would have made) around its sun since Prince Trel supposedly committed the heinous act of murdering his wife. It is a term he hasn't used since arriving on Earth, where 'revolution' loosely translated into 'year' in English.
"They're gone then?" he asks, visible relief washing over his entire being. "The traitors are gone? Or has it grown worse?"
Mon-El sits back on his haunches and lifts his eyes in search of Kara's, who knows immediately what he seeks. Comfort. Support. It is no easier to tell someone that their world is gone, then to be the one on the receiving end of such news. It is fact she learned upon meeting him and one he now must face. She nods her head slowly.
"They're gone," he confirms. "It's all gone. Thirty-eight revs ago…Krypton's core become unstable and the planet exploded. Daxam was lost in its wake," he explains gently. "We had very little warning. To my knowledge…I am the only one that escaped Daxam's Fall."
Then, it's as if the mere possibility has erased the physical pain of his facial injuries. His need to know more outpacing the desire to keep pain at bay. "Then how did you…? How could you possibly know…?"
"We had all the pieces," Mon-El explains. "I found your letters – all of them – in the palace as a child. Kara," he turns to look back at her, "was able to put all the clues together. She knew you had come to the Phantom Zone."
"Our scientists called it the Aether then," Trel corrects. "Phantom Zone is much more apt. But the letter…I gave it to Haru to place in my lockbox and hide it away."
"Haru?" Kara asks, turning the name over, looking for some familiarity in the word. It is name common to both Kryptonians and Daxamites. "She was the woman who found you and Gata…in the garden maze…in Lure's Clearing?"
"Yes," he nods. "Yes…she hid us, at great peril. She was a Kryptonian spy, there to steal the knowledge of the Aether. She caught wind of the conspiracy to murder Gata and our unborn scion. She had great loyalty to my wife, and it was her idea to send us through. She was supposed to return the knowledge of accessing the Aether to Krypton and rescue us from there. We planned to seek…sanctuary. Something must have gone wrong."
"And the letter?" Kara asks.
"I…I instructed her to put the letter in the Code locked box and to close the lid. It was the only way to keep it safe from Kallas Max and the Trinitarians."
"Even your brother would not have been able to open it," Mon-El concludes.
"Correct. I had to leave something behind, in case Haru failed, though I had little hope of it ever being found. Only that someday new technologies might have allowed the lock to be cracked. Is that what happened?"
"Yes and no," Mon-El replies. "Code Lock technologies remained unchanged, it's what we could do with DNA that evolved."
"You are a Gand, no doubt," Trel guesses, studying Mon-El's features. "Born of Allic's progeny?"
Mon-El exchanges a glance with Kara and then one with Alex. Is this a truth that will help or damage? If there's one thing Mon-El has come to believe since arriving on Earth it's that hard truths are more easily digested fresh, then when stale. "Not exactly," he begins, taking a shuddering breath. "Your great grand-nephew, King Vir, used your DNA to have me cloned, in hopes of continuing the family bloodline that his enemies damaged beyond repair."
"But cloning is just a theory," he scoffs.
"Not anymore," Kara shakes her head. "By the time Daxam stole the technology from Krypton, we'd been using it for several decades already."
"You…you're…? Ah, yes," he closes his eyes tightly, mentally castigating himself for not seeing the obvious. "You have the same eyes. I should have seen it right away; it's just that it's been so long. House of Ur," he assumes.
"House of El, actually," she corrects. "It's how we were able to use the projector, and how we'll get out of this place."
"And yet you have the same blue eyes as my Gata. It's uncanny."
Alex chuckles. "What is it with Daxamite men and blue eyes?"
"You grew up on a planet with blue skies," Mon-El explains. "Blue skies…blue waters…everywhere you look is blue—"
"But on Daxam…blue is a rare sight. Even rarer than the green of the Dophelim flower," Trel finishes Mon-El's thought. "Where is this place with blue skies?"
"We'll take you there," Kara promises gently. "Where your wounds will be healed, and your strength regained."
"And then some," Mon-El adds with no small amount of irony.
"But…where is Gata?"
Alex pours a cup of the water and passes it to Prince Trel to drink. Gingerly, he drinks through a carved wooden straw he withdraws from his cloak. "Krypton sends the worst of their kind to this place. The kind that would enjoy the taste of defenseless prey. Can you imagine such a thing?" he asks his double. "Tell me Daxam has not changed in this regard!"
"No," Mon-El agrees. "It isn't our way…unless the prey chooses to be defenseless.
"But Gata cannot choose and Kol-Mer was willing to cut me to pieces to get his hands on her. So…I was forced to hide her. Her time runs thin. There isn't enough energy left on her stasis gem to leave this place," he confesses. "After his last attempt to get to her, I had to put her somewhere no one would look." With a groan, Trel stands up, straightening his body as though every bone and muscle in his body aches. Attacking Kara clearly came at a cost for him.
He sheds first his ratty cloak followed by what can only charitably referred to as shoes, these deposits are followed by his calf-length trousers and long tunic. Kara knows she should look away, offer the naked man some sense of privacy, but it's not every day a girl meets her mate's progenitor, and the basis upon which Mon-El's every cell is built.
Trel is thin – too thin – rangier than she's ever seen Mon-El, but it isn't hard to imagine that once returned to full health, his chest and legs will fill out nicely. As for other…endowments…there are few differences that she can discern, despite knowing the ways in which Mon-El was altered to suit King Vir's plan.
"Kara!" Mon-El hisses, his eyebrows set in a straight angry line.
She blushes, caught out ogling another man, even if, in some ways, he's the same man. "Just curious," she shrugs apologetically.
Trel climbs down into the spring, wading across the waist-deep pool, his hand skipping along the surface and causing ripples that go nowhere.
"Is now really the time for a swim?" Alex wonders.
Trel sinks down, disappearing beneath the pond's surface. When he breaks the surface a moment later, there's a limp form, heavily pregnant, cradled in his arms. Mon-El hastily steps forward to assist the weakened man with his heavy burden and knowing his own limits, Trel gratefully accept this assistance.
"You kept her underwater?" Alex guffaws, both shocked by the idea and simultaneously awed by the genius of it.
"She cannot drown while in stasis," he supplies, answering Alex's unasked concerns. "Her heart does not beat and therefore she does not breathe." Hastily he dons his clothes to ward off the chill of the dank cave, and so that the women will look him in the eye once more. Kryptonians are known to be excessively prudish when it comes to nudity, and if the way the smaller woman's eyes dart away from his nakedness is anything to judge, so too must be this blue-sky world from which she hails.
Gently setting the women down on the ground, Mon-El steps away and looks at the woman he'd spent many childhood years wondering about. Trying to reconcile the whispered rumors about her with the words she had written in the letters, knowing in his gut that the letters had the truth of it. Even without seeing her eyes, Mon-El can see a resemblance between the sleeping Gata and the woman he loves.
"Are you sure you aren't House of Ur?" Mon-El asks quietly, seriously.
For Kryptonians, bloodlines are everything, especially among the Ranked and the Guilded, and so every child learns their family history going back at least twelve generations. "Of course!" Kara realizes, recalling the sing-song family tree her father, Zor-El, made her memorize. "My great-grandmother was an Ur. Karan? No that's not it. Charan….?"
"Charys?" Trel supplies. "Charys Vax-Ur?"
"Yes that's it!" Kara grins. "Charys Vax-Ur married my great grandfather, Ter-El. Not a great story," she sighs, the smile slipping from her face. "They were killed as traitors…a supposed blight on the El name. But my grandfather eventually earned back our family honor."
"She is…was…Gata's cousin," Trel explains. "They were very close. She was closer to Charys than she was her own sister. She'll be saddened to hear of her death. Especially the manner of it. But not that a part of her lives on." Trel's eyes warm as they light on Kara.
"She's family," Kara realizes.
"So it would seem," Trel nods.
Clearing her throat, Alex asks Trel, "Is it okay if I examine her?"
"Are you a Physic of some kind?"
Confused by the question, Kara answers on her sister's behalf. "That's right. Alex is a Physic."
"I promise I won't hurt her, but you said it yourself…time grows thin."
After a moment of consideration, he steps back from his protective position of Gata's sleeping form and nods, making way for the Kryptonian's friend, Al-Ex.
Alex kneels before the woman on the floor, her hand passing over the glowing gem in the center of her chest. "How much time is left?" she asks.
"Moments only, I should think," Trel answers. "Taking her to The Partition will mean certain death for her. I cannot risk it!"
"I wouldn't worry about that, Trel," Mon-El consoles him.
Alex examines the stab wounds on Gata's belly, her mind formulating a prognosis for the woman's condition and that of her child.
"Alex?" Kara urges.
"Most of the wounds are superficial only and don't extend beyond the fascia…hestitation wounds, perhaps. There are two deep stab wounds, both potentially fatal to the mother in normal circumstances. One is easily repaired. But the other one was deep enough to compromise the fetus. I can't be sure without imaging, but my best guess is that her attacker possibly nicked the umbilical vein."
"What does that mean?" Mon-El inquires, his existing knowledge of medicine and medical jargon learned from binge-watching a drama about doctors. He didn't know what Alex meant, only that it didn't sound promising.
"We have to get this baby out of her…and quickly."