Selah had been at the DEO for half a week, but Alex had scarcely learned more than the girl's name. For the first two or three days, she was mostly unresponsive as the last of the drugs left her system, but at night she was plagued with nightmares and hallucinations. She would wake up screaming or writhing in pain, often zapping things with her heat vision. Kara and Alex took turns staying the night with her, to make sure nothing got broken too irreparably. Alex suspected that all of her powers had returned fully, and she watched in fascination as the girl's cuts closed up and healed, leaving no sign of any trauma.
Any time she tried to ask about what happened in the lab; however, Selah became mysteriously mute and would stop talking for hours. Having Kara around seemed to help a little bit- the girl seemed to be very slightly more relaxed with the hero, but she still refused to disclose any information about what had happened to her. Alex was trying her best to give space to process and to reassure her that she was safe, but it was tiring. For most of the day, Selah laid in bed looking at everything as if she was still trying to convince herself that this was indeed real.
"Hey," Alex said as she entered the room on the morning of the fourth day of Selah's stay. "How are we doing today?"
"I'm bored," Selah said flatly. "I've been sitting in this bed for days. My arms and head have healed up. Please, can literally anything happen now?" Alex smiled slightly.
"I know you're a bit anxious to be leaving," she said. "However, we still have a lot to do. We don't know how old you are, if you're legally of age, who your guardians are, where you'll be going, if that will be safe," she trailed off, seeing Selah's face change. "I know it sucks, love, and I'm really sorry but you need to start answering some questions if you want to leave soon."
"I'm legal," Selah muttered. "I'm nineteen."
"Thank you."
"They were my legal guardians," she hesitated. "The doctors. They got custody when I was fourteen."
"How?" Selah didn't reply, her hands playing with the hem of the bloodstained hospital gown she was still wearing. "Okay. Well, I come bearing gifts," Alex said, lifting up the duffel bag she was carrying. "Fresh clothes, a toothbrush, a few other things you might need. I picked them up last night." The girl took the bag silently and held it on her lap. "You can go change in the bathroom across the hall and clean yourself up. There's a shower in there, and if you need anything else you can use the call button."
"Am I allowed to shower alone?" Selah asked dryly. "I've barely been allowed to scratch my own head without one of your nurses jumping me."
"Yes," Alex said. "You have an hour. We'll check back in with you when you're done."
Selah stood in the bathroom for a long moment after the door closed, just thinking. It had been a long and confusing few days, filled with dreams and hallucinations of being in the lab and being held down and sliced open again, like a bug under a microscope. From what she could tell of Kara and Alex and the other doctors and nurses, they were all genuine and truly trying to help her, but that's what she thought of the scientists at the lab, too.
She looked at herself in the mirror and nearly recoiled at the sight. She hadn't seen what she looked like in months, and her gaunt face and tired eyes beneath the uneven mop of hair that fell awkwardly into her face looked so foreign that it was like she was staring at a stranger. She had definitely lost weight, and her limbs looked too long and gangly on her thin frame. She might as well be a walking skeleton.
Still the most shocking was her hair. She knew that they had cut it and she knew it was shorter, but she didn't expect it to be this short, cut nearly to the scalp in some places, and still hanging down her back in others. It was also greasy and matted, with enough dirt and grime in it to make it a mousy brown color.
Snapping out of her reverie, she reminded herself that she was there to take a shower. Pulling off the hospital gown, she grimaced again at the sight of her bony, bloodstained body. The marks and bruises from where all the tubes had been poked into her skin had long faded, but she still remembered where they were, and it was as if she could still feel them in her body. Turning on the shower, she stepped under the spray and allowed herself to cry for the first time in months.
She scrubbed herself until all the blood had washed off, and her skin was an angry pink. She rubbed shampoo and conditioner into her hair as best she could, and watched the blood and dirt go down the drain, wishing it was that easy to be rid of all the time in the lab, all the memories. She washed her face and brushed her teeth and put on some of the clothes that Alex had brought her, a tee shirt and jeans. She was working on combing through her matted hair when a knock came at the door.
"Hey," Alex's knocked gently on the door. "Just checking in. How are you doing?" Selah picked up the bag and went to the door, opening it.
"I'm fine." She said. "We can go back to the room now." Alex led her back to the med bay where they found Kara sitting on the counter, eating a donut.
"Hey," Alex greeted her sister. "I have to pop out for a meeting, but Supergirl is here to make sure you're okay."
"I don't need a babysitter," Selah grumbled, dropping her bag onto the floor.
"I know," Alex said. "I just want you to feel comfortable. You're okay?" The girl nodded, not making eye contact. "Okay. I'll be back later." She left the lab, leaving Kara alone with the girl.
"Donut?" Kara offered, holding out a takeout box. Selah shook her head, sitting down on the bed, still trying to rake a comb through her hair. She still had a few mats at the back of her head, and it was quite tangled from her shower.
"May I?" Kara asked, jumping down from the counter. She turned to face the hero and looked at her for a moment before handing her the comb. Kara sat behind Selah on the bed and began carefully working the comb through the girl's hair, trying her best to be gentle.
"They cut it," Selah said, surprising Kara. "When I was there. They said it was for cell research. And then they shaved it down for surgery. That's why it looks so bad."
"It's not that bad," Kara tried to offer, but the girl just laughed, surprising her again.
"It's like a mullet on speed. It's horrible." Kara chuckled as she worked out a knot.
"I didn't realize your hair was so light colored," she said. "I thought it was brown but it's more of a reddish blonde."
"Not being allowed to wash your hair for six months will do that to you," Selah said. The two sat in silence for a while, as Kara kept carefully untangling the knots and combing the girl's hair out until it was all smooth. Once she was done, she began tying the girl's hair back into a French braid, doing her best to get all the shorter pieces in.
"You're good," Kara said, setting the comb down once she was finished. "All done."
"Thanks," Selah murmured. "I guess I should get it cut soon too."
"Only if you want to, and only when you're ready. You don't have to rush into anything." The girl didn't reply, her hands fidgeting with the hem of her shirt.
"Hey, um," she said eventually. The hero looked up, her eyes meeting Selah's. "Thanks."
"Anytime." Kara handed the comb back to her, and Selah put it into her bag. "I know it's been a rough adjustment over the past few days, but we are here for you." Selah looked up, her eyes scanning Kara's.
"I think I have most Andromedan powers," she said suddenly. "But I have a few extras, too. I guess those are from my dad."
"I was wondering about that," Kara said. "Heat vision isn't a typical power for Andromedans, is it?" Selah shook her head. "Can you remind me what exactly Andromedan powers are? I've been trying to do research, but there's not much of anything on file."
"Flight, speed, strength, those are pretty universal for mostly all aliens, right?" Kara nodded as Alex opened the door to the lab and re-entered the room, taking the donut that Kara had left on the counter. "Then just telekinesis and telepathy, and accelerated healing."
"Wait, hold on a second," the doctor interjected through a mouthful of sprinkles. "Telepathy?" Selah looked vaguely guilty. "You can read minds?"
"Not in the traditional sense," she said, biting her lip.
"What does that mean?" Kara asked.
"I can't help hearing people's thoughts, I just hear them like I hear talking. I can also put my thoughts into someone else's head, but I'm not as good at that one."
"So, you've been able to read my thoughts this whole time?" Selah nodded slowly. "And everyone around you?" She nodded again. Alex sighed heavily. "You're going to have to sign a bunch of non-disclosure forms," she said. "What are your other powers?
"I can hear things and see things, even if they're far away, and see through walls and shit, and then just heat vision and freeze breath," Selah replied. Alex bit her lip, turning to Kara.
"That sounds Kryptonian," Kara said. "Where did you say that your dad was from?"
"I didn't," Selah replied. "Never met the guy."
"Would I be able to do a blood test?" Alex asked carefully, already suspecting the answer. "We can run it through the system and see if there's any matches to a species." Selah immediately pulled her arms in closer to her body and moved her eyes away from Alex's again. "Okay," the doctor said. "Maybe another time. Only if you want to."
Alex went home that evening to spend the night at her apartment for the one of the first times that week. Throwing her keys down, she pulled out her phone to text Kara.
'Hey,' she wrote. 'finally home, coming over tonight?'
She tossed her phone onto the couch and went to change out of her work clothes, massaging her sore feet as she went. Her old boots had worn out, so she had to buy a new pair of DEO issued steel toed combat boots and despite her wearing them almost non-stop for a week, they still weren't broken in yet. Once she was changed into sweatpants and her old National City University tee shirt, she checked her phone again.
'OMG, yes,' Kara had replied. 'I'm coming over with pizza right now.'
'Don't text and fly,' Alex sent back with a smirk. Going to the fridge, she pulled out a beer for herself and orange juice for Kara. Just as she was setting them on the coffee table, her sister pulled open the balcony door holding a pizza.
"Hey," she said pulling Alex into a hug.
"Did you fly over here in normal clothes holding a pizza?" Alex demanded. "You're going to get yourself outed as Supergirl."
"I flew faster than any drone can see. Besides, it's nighttime and it's cloudy." Alex gave her a disapproving look. "Do you want pizza or not?"
"Yes, please." Kara put her bag on the floor and brought the pizza to the coffee table, plopping down on the couch.
"How are you?" She asked. Alex sighed, grabbing a slice of pizza. "That bad?" Kara asked.
"Can't stop thinking about Selah."
"Me neither."
"She still doesn't trust me. I just want to help, and I think she knows that, but she still doesn't trust me at all." She took a long sip of her beer, grimacing at the taste.
"She's been through trauma, Al." Kara says, her voice soft. "It's a miracle she even talks at all."
"I know." Alex replied. "And I know it will take time. It's just so hard seeing her and all the ways they hurt her."
"It sucks." Kara said. "That could have very easily been me if I didn't end up with you guys. It doesn't seem fair."
"We wouldn't be sisters." Alex replied. Kara turned to her; her eyes sad.
"I'm really thankful for you, Al," she said. The agent threw her arm around her sister and gave her a side hug.
"You too," she replied. "I don't suppose she revealed any deep dark secrets to you while I was in my meeting?"
"Besides the fact that she can read minds?" Kara asked, laughing dryly.
"Besides that, yeah."
"No, but that does remind me," the hero sat up slightly, tossing her pizza slice onto the table. "I combed out her hair for her today, and there's a piece of metal embedded into her skull. It looks like a bolt or a screw or something. I didn't ask her about it, but what could that have been for?"
"Is it a plate, or is it just the one piece?" Alex asked, her forehead crinkling.
"Just the one piece, but there's a wider base on the inside of her skull. It looked like it was made to screw something onto her head and have it anchored from the inside."
"Nothing mechanical in it?"
"No."
"My guess is that it's the base that they screwed a power dampener into," Alex took another long sip of her beer. "Probably for her mind reading. Like the one we had for Psi, but permanent." The sisters sat in silence, letting the gravity of Alex's statement set in.
"Poor girl," Kara murmured. "Should we offer to remove it? Can we even remove it?"
"I'd have to look at it to know for sure. It's up to her if she lets us take it out, I guess. On the one hand it might make her trust us more, because we're unequivocally saying that she is allowed to have her powers here, no matter," Alex sighed a little, "how many NDA's she has to sign. But it also might make her guards go up, because that's surgery, and she doesn't seem to have a great track record when it comes to people giving her brain surgery." It was quiet again, as both women thought about what could have possibly gone on in that lab, knowing that whatever horrors they imagined probably weren't too far from the truth.
"We'd better catch the bastards who did this," Kara muttered.
"We will," Alex replied, hoping she was right.
.
.
