When Selah awoke again, she was relieved to find that the incredible pain in her head had subsided. It was also a relief to see that she wasn't in the cell anymore. Instead, she was sitting cross legged in the middle of... nothing. As far as she could see in all directions was a vast expanse of white nothingness. It reminded her of the in-between breach that she and Kara had been stuck in when they travelled between worlds, but this time as she looked around, there was no swirling fog, and there was no exit.

As if summoned by her thoughts, when Selah turned her head back around, she recoiled to suddenly see Kara standing motionless only a few feet away. Her eyes were glassy and unfocused, and she stared right through the girl as if she wasn't even there. Selah cautiously stood up and took a step towards Kara, but as soon as she moved, the hero snapped into reality.

Selah froze.

"Kara?" she asked tentatively, but the malicious smirk spreading across Kara's face confirmed that this was not her. The girl stepped back again, feeling her heart quickening in her chest.

"037." It wasn't Beta's voice coming out of Kara's mouth, Kara's voice was still her own, but the tone was sharp and cruel, mirroring the way that Beta spoke.

"Why are you still pretending to be her?" the girl asked, squaring her shoulders as she stared at not-Kara

"I'm not pretending." She raised an eyebrow as she sized up Selah icily. "Far from it, in fact." Her body began flickering as if it was a hologram, shifting erratically. "So many new forms to take on. But which to choose?" In an instant, her form mutated and she changed to Alex, and then Nia, and then Lena, and then Brainy, and then-

"Stop," Selah said firmly. Beta switched back into her own form, still smirking. "What do you want with me?"

"I still have so many plans, my dear."

"I'm sure you didn't plan on us killing you," Selah glowered. "We did, didn't we? At the lab."

"The explosion was lethal," Beta admitted. "I do believe that the only survivors were you and the Kryptonian."

The girl felt guilt settle firmly in her stomach, thinking of all the doctors and guards who were also killed. How their thoughts had been so human. She was reminded of the guards in the hallway that she and Kara hid from, and how one was talking about a wife he would never go home to, who would never see him again. But she didn't have any more time to think on it, as Beta continued.

"Thankfully," she said. "Material forms are not the only body for existence."

"What do you mean? How are you still here if we killed you?"

"I trust you recall me implanting a device into your brainstem?" Selah offered no response. "This, as I'm sure you deduced, allowed me to connect into your psychic energy, channeling it and using it as my own. However, this experiment came with some unforeseen... limitations."

"Alex removed the device. So how are you still here?"

"I'm certain that Doctor Danvers managed to remove the main part of it, yes. However, that was only the surface layer of the design. My team bioengineered functional neural tissue that was attached to the chip, connecting it directly into the various areas of your brain that control your psychic powers." Seeing the confusion on Selah's face, Beta laughed quietly. "I'm sure you've heard of the medical breakthroughs where they grow new cardiac valves for people who have suffered heart damage. This is widely the same, albeit much more intricate. Thankfully, you were a most willing participant, always giving us new samples of tissues, blood, stem cells, nerves, neural tissue, all in exchange for us not hurting your Kryptonian friend," she trailed off, her face growing more serious again. "We also grew tissue from my samples, with my genetic makeup. These were grafted into yours, and all implanted into your body."

"No," Selah said, her mind whirring as she processed all that the woman was telling her.

"Ah, but yes. The genetic code on your brainstem is now intermingled with mine, linking us in a very unique way. Not only do I have access to your psychic abilities, but I can also see into all the deep recesses of your mind. And in time, my neural tissue will spread deeper into your brain and it will control more neural pathways, more senses, until eventually I will control your movement, your decision making, your emotion, every facet of your being that makes you the person that you are." She took a step closer to Selah, standing uncomfortably close to the girl with elation twinkling in her dark eyes. "You may have killed my body, 037, but soon, yours will provide a new one for me."

"And that will kill me," the girl stated flatly.

"Oh, and now we have reached my favorite part of it all. You will not die. Instead, you will remain trapped here, inside of what used to be your psyche. You will be unable to stop me, and unable to do anything but watch as I control everything."

"Then why are you telling me all of this? Why am I trapped here in my mind prison with you?"

"That brings us back to the situation at hand." Beta grinned again, but now her eyes were devoid of all emotion. "I told you there were limitations to this. As it seems, I cannot take over your mind unless you allow me in further. However, you cannot easily stop my progression either. We have reached an impasse of sorts. Neither one of us can proceed without making the necessary sacrifices that need to be made. Are you willing to hear what you will have to do in order to stop this?"

"Absolutely not." Selah said solidly. "I am done playing your mind games, and I am done negotiating with you."

"So you would prefer sitting here in a stalemate, instead of taking action?" She flicked back to Kara's form. "What happened to never giving up?"

"Let me guess, I have to kill someone? Multiple people? I have to defraud the sick and elderly? Kick some puppies, burn down an orphanage?"

"Can we calm down on the dramatics?" Beta asked. "Nothing that sadistic."

"What then?"

The immovable smirk on Beta's face pulled further upwards.

"You have to make me leave."

.

"Are you sure this isn't from the surgery?" Kara asked again. She was pacing around Alex's lab in the DEO as her sister typed intently on her laptop, standing over the cot where Selah laid unconscious.

"I don't know," Alex replied, clearly frustrated.

"Nothing on the MRIs indicate anything related to it," Lena added from her work station.

"I need an extra hand," Alex said, not looking up. The CEO stood up and peered over the agent's shoulder at her work. "Does anything in these scans look abnormal to you?"

"Nothing that I can see. Did you do another EEG?"

"I've been doing them every hour. Her brain activity is completely normal. She still has her powers, there's no signs of any trauma to the brain, and she hasn't had any seizures."

"Are her pupils reacting to light?"

"Yeah. They're completely normal."

"It's been three hours," Kara said, spinning on her heel to face Alex and Lena. "How do we not have any information?"

"I don't know," Alex admitted. "I've never seen anything like this before."

The hero pulled her glasses off and scanned Selah's body for the millionth time, knowing that it was no use. Nothing was out of the ordinary, nothing seemed wrong with the girl at all, except for the fact that she was in a coma. She sank into her chair beside Selah's cot and looked at the girl. Her eyes were shut, although every now and then her eyelids shifted, as if she was dreaming. Her face was expressionless, and Kara flicked away an errant curl off of Selah's forehead. The light freckles on the girl's cheeks were faded under the harsh light of the lab, and Selah just looked so small and vulnerable.

It scared Kara.

Lena and Alex were no consolation, her sister's forehead was crinkled in confusion and frustration and concentration as she scoured scans and test results, desperately searching for any clue as to what was wrong with Selah. Kara recognized that desperation from the times that Alex pulled all-nighters to write essays or study for exams when they were still in high school.

Lena was slightly more composed, but the crease between her eyebrows revealed her stress as well. Her hair was tied up away from her face in an impossibly tight ponytail, and she wore a suit that Kara recognized as one of her work outfits from L-Corp, not her usual lab attire. She must have come straight from L-Corp to the DEO to see what she could do- if anything- to help.

As if Alex sensed Kara's despondence, she stood up abruptly and shut her laptop.

"I'm going to go check on Brainy's progress with the psychic bridges we used to go into Reign's mind," she said.

"Yeah, why is that taking so long?" Kara badgered. "When I was in a coma he managed just fine to get into my mind."

"Selah's not a full Kryptonian, so it changes the way the bridge works. Plus she already has psychic powers, which also complicates the connection. Not to mention the fact that she's an Empath Andromedan, making it significantly more difficult for her to connect with Brainy. Lea came in and she's working with him, but they said it could still be a few hours."

Kara felt her shoulders deflate slightly, and she tipped her head back, looking up at the ceiling.

"Lena, can you take a blood sample from Selah and test it against the results from yesterday?" Alex asked. Lena nodded mutely, finishing her typing before going to get a blood kit. Alex stopped just before the door and put a hand on Kara's shoulder.

"We're going to figure this out," she said. Kara just nodded, tears pricking at the back of her eyes.

"I'm going to stay with her," she told her sister, who squeezed her shoulder before exiting. Lena put the kit down beside Selah on the cot and carefully prepped a needle. Kara forced herself to watch as the needle was inserted into Selah's arm and the tube began filling with the girl's blood, despite feeling her stomach twinge at the sight.

'Maybe,' she thought idly. 'That could be enough to pull her out. If I feel enough, she'll feel it too, and she'll wake up.'

Even as she entertained the thought, she couldn't bring herself to hope it would work as she studied the girl, who was as motionless as ever.

"I just wish she would wake up," she whispered. Lena glanced up from her work to meet Kara's eyes.

"We have the best minds on the planet working towards this," she said, trying her best to reassure the hero as she filled a second tube. "We are going to fix this, and we'll get Selah back."

"She's my family, Lena. We have to get her back. After everything we went through in that cell, with all the things we did to get back home, it can't end like this."

"It won't." Kara didn't need telepathy to see that Lena was as uncertain as she was, but the CEO still offered a weak smile. "I should get these into the system," she said, gathering up the blood samples.

"Okay."

Lena quietly left the room, shutting the door behind her, leaving Kara alone with Selah. She took the girl's hand and held it gently, hoping that wherever the girl was, she could feel it.

.

.

.