Maggie waited at a corner table, waiting for M'gann to give her an indication that the alien she wanted to speak to was here. She had gone through all her contacts to see if anyone knew anything about the alien that had hurt Alex and finally she got a name of one that might know something. Unfortunately, it was not anyone she knew. He went by a human name - Brandon.

She knew investigations took time, but she felt a sense of urgency like she never felt before. She didn't even know what she was going to do when she found this K'artr. All she knew is she needed to find him.

When the 24 hours of sedation were up, she had gotten a text from Winn to say Alex hadn't woken and might not for several hours.

She had gone back to Alex's place after leaving the DEO. Her stuff was still there, which is what she told herself, but she had lingered there in the apartment. Sitting on the couch, she felt lost. She didn't really know what to do about any of this.

Had she messed this all up, she wondered. Alex had moved on with this Cassie woman and she should be happy that Alex was finally experiencing an open, honest life, but she wasn't happy. Sitting there she thought about what it would be like to come into this apartment, sit on the couch with Alex, maybe watch a movie or just lie there together.

She had that chance with Alex and lost it though.

The least she could do is try and be friends with her and try and find the alien responsible for her lying in that hospital bed.

That is why she was sitting here now waiting. She was nursing a drink for appearance sake as she was technically working. When she returned to the precinct she may have told her boss a little white lie about working a case with the feds. She gave him Winn's number for confirmation, not that she expected him to call it. She had worked up enough trust now with her commander that he hadn't questioned it much.

Besides, it had been slow in their division for the past week, which was why she had been allowed the time she took to be with Alex.

Her phone buzzed and she saw it was a text from Alex just as M'gann nodded to her, indicating that Brandon was now here. As much as Maggie wanted to check to see what Alex had texted, she put her phone away, downed her drink and walked over to the bar where Brandon was ordering a drink.

"Put it on my tab," Maggie said to M'gann. "And I'll take another."

Brandon turned toward her. "Why hello pretty lady," he said. "To what do I owe the drink?"

"I'm Maggie," she said. "Why don't you join me at my table and we can talk."

"Maybe we can do more than talk," he said.

"Doubtful," she smiled as she held up her badge.

…

Maggie exited the bar not feeling much better after speaking with Brandon. He claimed not to know anything, but he did offer to check it out for her.

She couldn't tell if he was lying to her or not. Her focus was just off.

As it was the conversation took more than an hour because Brandon liked to ramble and go off on tangents when he spoke.

She pulled out her phone and saw the text from Alex. There was also one from Winn telling her that Alex was awake and that the doctors hadn't found anything wrong with her.

"Damn it," she said to herself. She knew that wouldn't go over well with Alex. Clearly there was something wrong with her or she wouldn't have been in such pain.

She decided instead texting she would call Alex, but it went directly to voicemail.

"Hey, it's me," she said. "Maggie. I got your text and I was just calling to see how you were doing. So, yeah, just call me back or text and let me know how you are feeling."

Hanging up the phone, she felt like an idiot and wondered if her message was even coherent.

Maybe she should go to the DEO and check on Alex in person, she thought. Then she discarded that idea. Even if she went, what would she do, sit there in awkward silence with her.

She just wanted Alex to be ok, but she was beginning to think it was going to be awhile before she was anywhere close to ok.

…

Alex was sitting up in bed, listening to her mother speak with Jeffrey and Charles. They were all talking like she wasn't there, but for once Alex didn't mind. It had been two days of lying here in medbay and she was so done with it all.

She wanted to go home, which was part of what the three of them were discussing. She had no other episodes although she was still getting the occasional headache. A part of her wanted to point out that the headaches only seemed to happen when other people decided to come into the room to check on her, although it wasn't technically true, it felt true to Alex.

But the doctors weren't ready to release her – feeling like it would be best if she continued to rest there for a couple of days. Eliza was inclined to agree with them, but she also knew her daughter was way past her patience threshold at this point.

And her mom seemed to be leaning more toward the explanation that her symptoms were psychosomatic.

Not that Alex blamed her entirely – after all every test they ran showed nothing was wrong with her eyes beyond the initial diagnosis of her blindness. At this point Alex was ready to believe it was all in her head – another reason she wanted to go home.

Of course, during her two days of being there (three if you counted the time she was asleep) she had been visited by Kara, Winn, J'onn and even James had stopped by for a quick hello. Maggie hadn't been back though and Alex tried not to let that thought linger in her mind.

When she listened to Maggie's message she had replied in a text to let her know she was fine – whether it was the truth or not. But she didn't know what else to say so when Maggie had simply responded, "good to hear," Alex hadn't replied back.

She had spoken again to Cass – twice actually, in addition to several text message exchanges. Cass had called her each day to see how she was doing, to see when she would be released from the hospital and coming home. She had made it clear that when that happened she wanted to come over to see Alex. At least Alex didn't have to lie when she told her she didn't know when she would be let out.

Since she didn't want to talk about herself, she changed the subject to ask Cass about her work and other topics and Cass must have sensed that Alex didn't want to talk about her injuries so she backed off.

She was still unsure of how to approach a serious talk with her, especially in light of these calls. Cass hadn't mentioned anything about backing off of their relationship, although Alex hardly expected Cass to do so over the phone. Cass was very much a face-to-face kind of person.

As she sat there, she kept her eyes closed. She found she was doing that more often – keeping them closed because what was the point of keeping them open. Not that her mom would let her get away with it when she was being spoken to.

"Mom," she said, deciding it was time to interrupt this conversation. "I'm ready to go home."

"I know you are Alexandra, but …"

"No, you're not listening to me," she said. "I'm ready to go home and I'm going home." She started to move from the bed – something she had gotten better over the last couple of days. She could actually navigate the room quite well now, although she had yet to leave it.

Getting clothes to wear had been one of her first demands and so at least she wasn't having to wear a hospital gown. Kara had brought her to clothes from her apartment thankfully.

She heard her mom whisper, "let me speak to her," and she heard Jeffrey and Charles leaving. By this time she was fully out of bed.

"Don't," she said to Eliza – hoping to stop her before she started some sort of lecture. "I'm going home and that's final. I'm going crazy here. You all have run test after test and I'm done. Maybe Jeffrey is right, maybe what happened was just in my head."

"You don't believe that."

Alex shrugged. "There is no data to suggest it was anything but that so it's not a matter of belief at this point."

"You were injured in an alien attack, an alien we don't know much about," Eliza said. "There is no way of knowing if that was some sort of after affect or what. A couple more days, that's all I ask."

"No," she said. "I want to go home. I want to be in my apartment where I know where everything is at and where I can move around without constantly wondering if I am going to run into something or someone. I'm blind and it's not going to get any better for me."

Again, she flinched as her mother touched her. She wasn't expecting to be pulled in for a full embrace and she almost stumbled. "My beautiful, brave daughter, even if it doesn't get any better, I'm worried if it gets worse," Eliza said.

"I know," Alex said softly. "But I can't stay here. Not here. I worked here and …"

She couldn't finish the sentence. She couldn't give voice to how painful it was to be there at the DEO, being back here in the medbay when she would never again be out there with the people she worked with.

"Ok," Eliza said, sensing the turmoil her daughter was feeling. "We'll take you home.

….

Alex walked beside Kara with her mom and J'onn walking ahead of them. It had taken a couple of hours but she was finally getting to go home. They were walking to the underground garage where they would take one off the DEO issued vehicles to drive home. Kara had offered to fly her but Alex told her it wasn't necessary. Besides, she got the feeling she wouldn't be let out of her mom's sight for the time being.

She really hoped her mother wasn't planning on staying for very long.

They reached the car and she heard the doors being opened and she let Kara direct her to the passenger side seat. J'onn had only accompanied them down to sign out the car for them. She heard him give the keys to Eliza and then he came around to side of the car. Her window was down and he must have bent down a bit to speak to her.

"Get well," he said. "Because once you heal up, whether you can see or not, doesn't mean you stop being one of my agents so I expect you back here."

She resisted the urge to ask him what he expected her to do and instead nodded at him. Once Kara was in the back seat and the car was started, she expected it to start moving, but it wasn't.

"Do you want help with your seat belt?" Eliza asked.

"No, I got it," she said, but reaching for it with her right hand wasn't nearly as difficult as trying to get it buckled without the use of her left. It took her several tries and was about two seconds of telling her mom to forget about the damn thing when she finally got it latched.

"Alright, let's get you home," Eliza said and Alex felt the car shift slightly as it was put into drive. She kept her eyes forward and imagined what it looked like as they began to drive up the ramp to get outside. She had taken that drive many times – on her bike, driving one the DEO vehicles, as a passenger, and she realized she wasn't sure if the walls were grey concrete or if there was some other color on them. Just another thing she never took notice of and would never see again.

She slumped down in the seat a bit as she felt the ramp level off.

Almost immediately, her head began to ache again. Her mom was speaking to Kara and she tried to concentrate on what was being said, but her headache was getting worse. She exhaled and rubbed her forehead.

"Is something wrong?" Eliza asked.

"No," she said.

Even as she said it she knew it wasn't the truth. Her headache was increasing too fast, just like back in her apartment and it had already reached the point where she could feel it behind her eyes.

Somehow, she knew what was coming next and she shielded her eyes with her right forearm at the same time she said, "turn the car around."

"Alex, what's wrong?" Kara asked. But Alex didn't respond, instead she moved quickly to release the seat belt and she doubled over in the seat, keeping her head down and her eyes closed as the burning sensation was back. She barely registered the car turning as she was trying hard not to scream out in pain.

She felt like if she didn't keep her eyes protected they were going to catch on fire and leave her with only burned out sockets. With some relief – not from the pain – she felt the car descending again. As they came to a screeching stop, she reached for the handle to get out of the car, but it was locked. The moment she heard it unlocking she exited it and nearly fell to her knees and would have if Kara hadn't been there to giving her a helping hand.

"Get her back to medbay now," she heard her mom say and a second later she felt the familiar woosh of being picked up and carried at high speeds. She guessed they were back in the room she had been in when Kara let her down and while she didn't know what way she was facing, she began to feel around to get her bearing.

"Restroom," she said.

Kara directed her the right way and entered it, closing the door behind her and promptly threw up in the toilet. Between the pain and high speed, her stomach was in knots. Even as she puked she kept her eyes shut, not trusting what would happen if she opened them.

The pain was still there, but it wasn't as bad as it was in the car.

There was a knock at the door. "Alex," she heard Jeffrey say. "Alex, I'm coming in."

She heard the door open and the light switch being turned on. "Are you ok?"

She nodded as she felt her headache again notch up a bit. "It happened again."

"Ok," he said. "Let's get you back into bed."

She let him help her up and direct her back to bed as her mother came in. "What's wrong?"

"We're going to run some more tests," Jeffrey said, "But first, Alex on a scale of 1 to 10 how bad is the pain?"

"I don't know, seven maybe."

"Did anything happen that triggered it?"

"No, I don't think so."

"Nothing," Eliza said. "We were just driving her home and we had barely left here when it happened."

"Was it like before?" Jeffrey asked.

She nodded. "Headache and the pain in my eyes. Can I get something for the pain?"

"Of course."

She heard him step away and her mom came over and brushed her hair back. "We're going to figure this out honey, I promise."

Jeffrey returned and explained he was giving her a shot of morphine and a sedative, but not enough to keep her sedated for 24 hours like before. He wanted her awake so he was just giving her a mild one.

She felt each injection barely as her mind was still concentrated on her eyes. The burning sensation was lessening, but she still had a headache.

"This is not psychosomatic," her mother said. "There has to be a cause for this.

"Alex, can you think of anything that was the same about each time it happened, besides the pain?"

Either the sedative he gave her wasn't as mild as he claimed or this latest episode had taken a bit out of her because she felt tired suddenly. She tried to think about each attack and if there were any similarities, but nothing was coming to mind.

"Alright, Alex, I'm going to open up your right eye and take a look."

She really didn't want to open her eyes, but she didn't feel like there was much of a choice. She felt him gently pull her eyelid up, but again there was nothing there for her to see. There was still pain there, but not the burning like it was before. She blinked several times, unable to help it as she felt the need to close her eyes. Each time Jeffrey opened it back up again before moving on to her left to repeat the process.

"Alex," this time it was her mother and her voice sounded not so much concerned but intrigued. "Why are you blinking so often?"

The question confused her. Why wouldn't she blink? Having someone hold open your eye lid wasn't exactly normal, plus it still hurt, in fact it had gotten a little bit worse since she came out of the bathroom.

"I don't know," she said. "Don't like having my eyes held open."

Then she paused and asked, "Why do you ask?"

"Because you are blinking every time the doctor is shining the light directly into your eye," Eliza said. "Your eyes aren't reacting to the light, but every time it is shone directly into it you are blinking, almost as if …"

She trailed off and Alex finished the thought for her. "Almost as if I'm trying to shield my eyes from the light."

That was the connection she realized. Light.

….

When Maggie saw it was Alex calling her, she answered it immediately.

"Hey Danvers, how are you feeling?"

"Um sorry Detective Sawyer, this is Alex's mom,"

"Why are you calling with her phone, did something else happen? Is she ok?" Maggie asked immediately. It couldn't be good if she was getting a phone call from Alex's mom.

"Alex had another episode but she is ok. We think we might have determined a cause, but I need to ask you a few questions about what happened at the apartment when it first happened. Do you have time?"

"Yeah, whatever you need."

"Thank you. Kara couldn't remember when she flew in to get Alex if the curtains were open or not, do you happen to remember?"

"They were open," Maggie said. "I had opened them that morning to let some light in. I think given what happened to her, Alex kept most of the lights off in the apartment and her curtains and blinds were closed. Why do you ask?"

"I will get to that in a moment. When Alex's eyes started to hurt was she facing any of the windows?"

Maggie paused while she thought about it. "Well, her head hurt first and that was in the kitchen, but I was leading her out to the couch so she could lie down when she started to say her eyes were hurting so yes she was facing the windows."

She heard Eliza exhale. "We believe that it is the light – particularly sunlight that caused the pain in her eyes. She wanted to go home today so I was driving her and as soon as we left the underground garage and were in full sunlight she started to have a headache and then it was her eyes again. We had to turn around and come back here. While the doctor was examining her we noticed she was blinking every time the penlight was shone directly into her eyes. She said she had been having headaches, but had written them off as being related to her concussion. We are thinking now that perhaps the headaches are because of lights. She mentioned that she thought the headaches were happening when people were around her, but it wasn't until this that she made the connection that when people were around her they were naturally turning on the lights."

Maggie considered all of this and had many questions, but she asked only one. "Is she allowed to have visitors, I'd like to come check on her?"