A/N: Hey guys! Totally haven't been gone for like 11 months or anything... can't believe I'm saying this, but I think I'm back!

To be candid, there were points in the past year where I thought I would never write anything again. So, this story means a lot to me.

It was inspired by two things mainly - The chorus of a song called Kingdom by Downstait (hence the title), and Cyberpunk 2077. I've fallen in love with the Cyberpunk genre in general, but several plot elements are heavily borrowed specifically from the game. Don't worry if you're not familiar with it, this story will still make sense to you.

Some warnings: Kara will be heavily OOC in this story (she is not the bubbly, optimistic Girl of Steel we love at all). There will be graphic violence and explicit language. This will be very angsty. And the smut scene in this first chapter is my first ever attempt, so... please, please take it easy on me if it's terrible XD

Lastly, thanks to my beta KaraSmoak for helping me with this. I can't promise a consistent upload schedule to you all just yet, but I hope you all enjoy this first chapter and the many more that will come in the future! :)


Sadostia. A small planet in comparison to the countless others found in the Milky Way, so small that it's globally run by what humans would call a unitary government. Not that it mattered much anyway, it was a hardly governable place. As opposed to the Terrans of Earth, who always have and always will believe themselves to be the center of the universe, Sadostia considered itself the exact opposite. It was a place for travellers, ragtag misfits, outsiders, mercenaries and nomads. All of which Kara Zor-El now was.

Sadostians on the outskirts of civilisation lived fairly quiet lives, keeping themselves far and away from the proverbial heart of the planet – Zuestea, its capital city. The vast majority of the planet's income is made through intergalactic tourism. Outsiders outnumber Sadostians in their own capital city by a ratio of 2 to 1.

Somewhere between the city outskirts and city center sat The Zoma, the galactic equivalent of a bar. Owned and run by Zax Dupree and his wife, Elz, it was just nice enough to be accommodating to the financially sound, but just rough enough to draw attention from some of the less gentrified crowd. Unfortunately, it was the latter who had decided to show up tonight.

The Zoma stayed open late into the night, but it had just tended to its last customers and Zax was cleaning up. A knock on the see-through door stole his attention from the bar counter he was wiping. A group of five nomads stood at the door, but he simply signalled to them that shop had closed for the night. They knocked again. And again. Zax ignored them, something they did not take kindly to. They didn't knock again, rather preferring to force the door open before closing it behind them. Zax knew all too well what this meant. He'd made good money tonight, of which all was about to be stolen.

"Got a problem?!" A large man at the center of the group with a green beard stepped forward, "Don't wanna serve us?"

"Look, don't want any trouble," Zax replied, raising his hands.

"Well, sometimes trouble comes looking for you," the man replied with a wicked smile, "I want your money, right now."

"Don't have cash."

"Think I don't know that, smartass!" he exclaimed, holding up a microchip in one hand while forcing a gun in Zax's face with the other.

"Take it easy, choom," Zax replied, slowly outstretching a hand to take the chip. Just as he was preparing to insert it into an access point, the bar received an unexpected sixth visitor.

One nomad had stayed by the door to be a lookout. It was usually an easy job, he just had to spot trouble and dissuade curious eyes from lingering. He did the former quite easily but there were a lot more than just curious eyes that needed to be dissuaded tonight. A blonde woman stepped to the door, grabbing the handle without noticing the man on the other side. She pushed once, then again harder before the nomad read the movement of her lips – "I swear it was 'push' the last time I was here."

She then tried to pull to no avail once again. The nomad tapped the glass, and it was only then did she raise her gaze and spot him blocking the door. "I'm trying to get in, asshole," she shouted.

He simply shook his head, raising the large machete in his other hand and gesturing for her to go elsewhere. She simply rolled her eyes and pushed much harder this time, forcing the door open with ease and shoving him back with so much force that he tumbled to the floor.

"What the fuck?!" The nomad leader shouted, now aiming his gun at her as the rest of his friends drew their variety of weapons, "Who the fuck are you?!"

Even if he'd been a 21st century native of Earth, he might not have recognised her as she looked today. The long blonde locks that were once a defining aspect of her image had been shortened to a pixie bob cut now, and the red and blue suit had been replaced by a brown leather jacket and jeans. She hadn't a care in the world as she strolled towards the counter, not even paying him a glance.

"Yo Zax, can I get a Slingshot?" she requested as she took a seat on one of the stools and placed her hands on the counter. Zax could tell immediately – She was buzzed out of her mind.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?!" the leader of the nomads shouted at her.

Without turning her head to look at him, she shrugged her shoulders and replied, "I just want a drink, Mr Greenbeard." She waited a few more seconds as the room remained stunned into silence before getting up, "Don't want to serve me? Okay, I'll serve myself."

She walked behind the counter and, possessing none of the patience nor wits needed to make the cocktail she requested, simply grabbed a bottle off the shelf and put it to her lips.

"Listen here, lady, if you don't get the fuck out, I'm gonna-" Mr Greenbeard couldn't finish his sentence as the lady raised a finger at him while she continued chugging the entire bottle. Once the entire contents of it had been downed, she slammed it onto the counter and wiped her lips before finally looking at him for the first time.

"You were saying?" she nonchalantly asked.

"I was saying you're gonna die if you don't get the fuck out."

Her eyes narrowed. "That's a bit rude, don't you think?"

"Kara-" Zax spoke up but he was quickly shushed by her.

"Ssh, ssh, no, no, I got this, I got this. Trust me," she replied, sending an affirming nod his way. She walked back around the counter, pushing Mr Greenbeard's gun away before stepping right up to him and poking his chest as she spoke, "If you don't get the fuck out, you're the one who's going to die."

He slowly raised the gun again, this time pressing the muzzle directly under Kara's chin. What would normally be a fear-inducing action simply drew stomach-aching laughter from Kara, "Please shoot me, I dare you! Come on, shoot me," she said through her laughter.

"Oh, I'm gonna shoot you, alright. Just not here right now," he replied, "I got a better idea. I'm gonna take you to a spot where no one will hear your screams and then me and my boys are going to take turns fucking your brains out. Maybe after that I'll finally decide to put a bullet in your skull. How does that sound, you whore?"

The smile on Kara's face quickly dissipated. In an instant, it seemed that she had entirely sobered up. The buzz in her head turned into rage coursing through her entire body. She swivelled her tongue around in her mouth, conjuring as much saliva as she possibly could before propelling it at his face. Greenbeard had finally had enough of Kara's antics. After raising his free hand to wipe his eyes, he pulled the trigger…

To no effect. Kara's head didn't even budge. Not a single muscle on her face had even twitched as the bullet crashed into her chin without even causing damage on a microscopic level. She waited just a split second long enough to see the confusion on his face turn to fear before slamming her hand into his chest. Having used her full strength, his body flew across the bar, crashing into one of his companions. That wasn't enough to stop his momentum, as the two bodies now clinging together flew into the far wall with enough force to shatter their spines and kill them instantly.

The machete-wielder at the door was Kara's next target, as she sped over to him before throwing a single punch that separated his head from the rest of his body. With fear having overridden their capacity to reason, the two remaining men on the other side of the bar fired their pistols several times with full knowledge that their bullets would have no effect. Kara didn't bother to speed over, rather choosing to take a brisk walk to watch their hopes to survive dwindle as the bullets bounced off of her. They ran out of ammunition by the time Kara had closed the distance between them, who grabbed both of them by the throat simultaneously. She effortlessly lifted them off their feet before slamming them down, splattering them across the floor.

And just like that, those five bastards were no more.

Kara casually dusted her hands before walking back to the counter and once again taking a seat on what was her usual chair. "Can I get that Slingshot now, please?"

Without missing a beat, Zax grabbed a glass and began preparing it, mixing the tonics with a sleight of hand. He sighed before speaking, "You didn't have to do that, Kara."

"They were going to take your money."

"I would have been fine. Now, I got a wrecked bar and five mangled corpses I need to clean up."

"Luckily, you know people who can clean it all up for you."

"That costs money. Maybe even more than what they would have taken away."

Kara pouted. "Ah, fuck. I'll cover the costs."

"You don't have to do that either."

"What do you want me to do?"

"You can down this," he said as he slid the glass towards her, "And then be on your way back to your place. Safely please, don't want you getting into any more trouble."

"Whatever you say, hoss!" replied Kara before downing the drink in one swoop. She plugged her transaction chip into the access point, entering the amount she was set to pay before standing up, "Thanks, Zax! And sorry for the trouble."

"All is forgiven," he replied. The notification for the amount of funds he was transferred popped up in the display of his mechanical eye, "Kara!"

"I told you I'd cover it all!" she screamed back as she exited the bar, "Wooo!"


It had been more than 20 years since the last time Kara had stayed in one place for more than 6 months. Her stay in Zuestea was coming up on 8 months and for good reason. Contracts for mercs were fairly easy to come by and if you were a good one, which she was, the pay was great. With the place she had been renting out less than a 10-minute walk from The Zoma, she became a regular visitor. She started tonight there before moving to other bars in the district to appreciate the full range of alcoholic drinks that Zuestea offered before returning just in time to fend off the nomads. Tonight wasn't the first time she had to do that for Zax, who always appreciated her efforts even if it meant he had to scrape blood and brains off the floor afterwards.

She stumbled up the stairs into her apartment building, having just enough wits to keep herself standing when she almost tripped on her own feet as she entered the elevator. Her initial thought process when choosing this area was that it was just nice enough but also just cheap enough for a quick stay. Despite it no longer being a quick stay, she hadn't bothered to move to the more affluent area of the city. It wasn't that far from here anyway. Anything or anyone that she needed or wanted from that area could reach her or be reached quickly. One such person was waiting for her in her unit and Kara was dying to get to her.

She fumbled with her access card in trying to get her unit door open, but the person inside heard her and opened.

Kara grinned, tilting her head to the side as she laid her eyes on the beautiful vixen before her. "Hey, Athena."

"You're late," Athena replied, a hint of annoyance in her tone.

"It's not like you have anywhere else to be right now."

"True," she replied, stepping aside to let Kara enter, "Drunk… again."

"There aren't many places in this galaxy where I can get drunk. So, I'm just taking advantage of it while I'm here."

"I'm not judging. But if this is you on a normal day, I really fear for your organs on your birthday."

"Ha, fun fact – I have two birthdays. Isn't that something? Well, used to. I don't really do the second one anymore."

"Is that so?" Athena snorted.

"I'm not lying. Anyway, what's with all this small talk? Just get over here already."

Athena smirked as she heeded Kara's command, who eyed her body from head and toe as she did so. The red hair, perky breasts, toned legs, Kara appreciated every inch of her. Dressed in shorts, a bra and a cropped jacket, the brazen clothing allowed Kara to feast her eyes on much of Athena's skin, plenty of which was tattooed with beautiful patterns of flowers native to Sadostia. Much of Kara's goofiness dissipated as she was being overcome by desire, staring at Athena's body with a tangible longing. Her gaze only shifted up to Athena's green eyes when her face was just a few centimetres away from her.

"You've been a very bad girl tonight, Kara," she whispered as she pushed a few strands of Kara's hair behind her ear, "You need to be punished. Problem is, I know you can handle pain. So, I'm going to have to resort to something a little… unconventional."

"And that is?" Kara asked, placing her hands at Athena's hips.

"Punishment by pleasure," Athena replied, breathing heavily on Kara's neck, "I'm going to make you come over and over and over again until you can't handle it anymore. Until you beg me to stop."

"That's not punishment. That's exactly what I want," Kara purred, letting her breath tickle Athena's ears.

"I know."

Athena pulled back slightly so that she was face to face with Kara once again, briefly glimpsing at her eyes before bringing her lips to Kara's. Kara's hands slid down from the hips, grabbing a hold of Athena's firm ass while she nibbled at Kara's bottom lip. She stepped back to take off her jacket, giving Kara a second to take her own off as well. They met again and this time the kiss was far more visceral and bold than the first one. Kara opened her mouth and pressed her tongue against Athena's lips, who accepted the invitation. With tongues in each other's mouths and hands wandering over their bodies, their sexual buzz heightened to an even higher level. Kara felt her underwear become noticeably moist and she wanted more.

Athena K'aron was not a lover to Kara Zor-El. How the two became linked was through a simple ability to meet each other's material needs. Athena needed money and Kara needed to get off.

As a high-profile sex worker that only serviced the wealthier individuals in the city, Athena was sceptical at first that Kara could afford her on a regular basis. Now, it had been five months since their very first meeting and Kara's bank account hadn't even come close to running dry.

Jumping from planet to planet, Kara had never settled down in one place long enough to start anything real with someone. Not that she wanted to. She'd been there, done that already and didn't care to go through the hassle again. She did care to have a good time though. Her bisexuality wasn't something that she fully explored during her time on Earth. Over the course of her intergalactic journey, she fucked both genders aplenty but never really developed a preference for one or the other. That was until she met Athena, whom she found irresistible from day one.

By this point in their arrangement, Athena could instinctively tell when Kara wanted to move on, so she pulled away and grabbed her hand, leading her to the bedroom that had seen many of their sessions. Kara tugged at her clothing with a fervour and Athena cooperated by undressing first. There was an impatience governing Kara, who was unable to control herself as Athena became bare in front of her. Her hands jolted forward to Athena's breasts, squeezing them while taking her mouth to the hard nipples. She frantically dropped her level to help pull Athena's shorts to the floor before undoing the straps of the heels she wore. Athena pulled her back up by the chin and began to return the favour. Unlike Kara, however, she took her time undressing her, appreciating every part of her body as a piece of clothing came off. Kisses started at the neck, moving to the shoulders before a short suction on each nipple. The series of kisses continued all the way down her abdomen until she squatted in front of Kara, undoing the buttons of her jeans and pulling them down slowly.

Now both almost completely bare, Athena nudged Kara down onto the bed and removed her boots. With all forms of clothing out of the way, Athena crawled beside Kara and placed her lips on hers again. She knew what Kara wanted, so she tantalisingly trailed her hand down Kara's body. She fixated on each of her nipples for a moment, rubbing them before continuing the course. She felt it all, as the hand transitioned from Kara's smooth skin down to a warm pool of moisture between her spread legs.

Athena ran her fingers up and down Kara's entirety for a few seconds for bringing her hand back up. Her hand hovered in front of Kara's face as she spread her fingers, showcasing the thick fluids that webbed her fingers.

"You're so fucking wet already," Athena gushed before placing her fingers in her own mouth, "You taste really good too."

"Stop teasing," Kara replied with an exasperated breath, losing whatever was left of her composure as the heat spreading under her skin demanded satiation, "Just fuck me already."

With a wicked smile, Athena almost leapt back and pulled Kara's legs towards her so that her head was firmly placed between them. She wasted no more time, immediately running her tongue over Kara's lips several times before bullishly sucking on her clit.

For Kara, the first wave of pleasure began to sweep over her body. With the ardour of a restless beach, the waves began to cascade, each one gradually growing in intensity. Kara's heavy breaths and subtle moans motivated the tongue on her even further. The licking and sucking stopped for a second, only to allow Athena to part Kara's folds and slide her tongue into her. As a Sadostian, her tongue was distinctly longer than almost every other humanoid species Kara had encountered, and this fact alone was the only reason why she enjoyed being tongue-fucked by her. The tongue eventually moved back to Kara's clitoris, finally fixating there as the final tidal wave of gratification began building at an immeasurable rate.

Her breathing became more erratic by the second and so did the words of profanity leaving Kara's mouth increase as she neared a climax. One hand of hers pressed Athena's head down while the other grasped at a handful of her own hair. Her subtle moans became louder and louder, finally turning into screams as the tidal wave crashed, a euphoric high having Kara feel as if she was floating.

Before she even had a moment to catch her breath, Athena leapt atop her, pinning her shaking body down and pressing her lips to Kara's. They weren't done with each other yet. Not even close. With a swift movement that went hardly noticed by Kara, Athena grabbed the vibration contrivance that she'd strategically placed on the bedside earlier. It looked far different from the vibrators that Kara had encountered on Earth, but it did the job much, much better.

Kara was all but entranced and hypnotised. Four of her five senses were dulled, but her sensitivity to touch had been amplified a thousand-fold. At this point, Athena could do no wrong even if she tried to. Once again, she was by Kara's side, teasing by tenderly pulling on her lips with her teeth. Kara's breath hitched as a rumbling touch pressed against her center of pleasure, providing a rush of tingling sensations through her abdomen. The large head of the vibrator was large enough to stimulate her clitoris and opening at once. One hand grasped at the bedsheet beneath her, beginning to tear the fabric apart while her other now sat between Athena's legs, cyclically stimulating her. She only had to wait half as long to reach climax this time, with the added sensation of Athena's mouth working her nipples causing a second orgasm that had Kara convulsing.

With her legs still quivering from the two highs that had momentarily stolen control of her body, her eagerness took a different form. As much as Kara relished receiving, she was still a giver. She took the vibrator from Athena's hand, pushing her on her back for the first time and whispering just one phrase into her ear with a heavy breath.

"My turn now."

She wasted not another second in sliding down Athena's body, placing hurried kisses all the way from her neck right down to her slit. Kara began with the point of her tongue, flicking back and forth on Athena's clit. Noises were drawn out of Athena that Kara could tell hadn't been paid for. Biting back groans, letting out giggles of delight, it was written all over Athena that Kara was the one client she genuinely enjoyed being with. Parting Athena's lips, the moans became anything but subtle when Kara stuck two fingers inside of her before pressing the vibrator against her now swollen clit. With nerves striking fire and a pressure building between her thighs, Athena's muscles tightened as she awaited the impending release like a spring that was being coiled. The burning fire in her abdomen raged, forcing a series of heavy gasps accompanied by a shuddering of her silky legs.

Free of any restrictions and with plenty of remaining energy, they were barely halfway through this ride. Such was the usual for their arrangement. One orgasm was often enough for Athena, having gotten used to having none with the majority of her clients. She stayed true to her word this night, making Kara come twice more until she literally couldn't physically handle another peak. Kara was always more than willing to return the favour, but in the end, it was Athena's job to please her, not the other way around. In the beginning, the reason for that was simply that Athena was the one being paid to do so, but now it had evolved beyond that for her. She genuinely enjoyed pleasing Kara. Athena loved sending her to sky-high euphoric heights before allowing her to crash down and then doing it over and over again until both of them were too fatigued to keep going.

Her arrangement with Kara differed from that of other clients in several more ways than one. Rather than bolting out the door as soon as the session was finished, Athena stuck around. They would lay in bed together afterwards, often times still nibbling at each other's lips and running their fingers over each other's bodies. She didn't fully know why. To catch their breath was one reason, another being that their sexual chemistry frankly just made it difficult to untangle their bodies even after they were spent.

But there was definitely something beyond the physical that kept them close to each other. Love? It seemed inane and laughable to suggest in the face of their cynicism. Even friendship was a stretch, though Athena often felt that they were getting closer to that. Perhaps it was because they just needed it as two people both so lonely and isolated, lacking any single form of companionship in their lives apart from each other.

The crash tonight was amongst the worst that Kara had ever experienced. She plummeted from a high that was induced by multiple orgasms along with a deathly amount of alcohol. Sobriety had already begun to quickly set in due to her body's expeditious ability to process anything that she consumed. The headache was just starting to set in as she and Athena had begun to separate from each other. Despite an exhausted body and aching mind, Kara willed herself up to a seated position on the edge of the bed. The half-full bottle of water on her bedside was emptied as she downed it in an instant.

"Still drunk?" Athena asked.

"I wish," Kara replied.

"Always wondered how you're able to sober up so fast."

"My body processes alcohol fast."

"And why is that?"

There it was. A dreaded personal question. They had usually been scarce between the two. All of the personal information they knew about each other had been blurted out rather than prompted with a question. At least, in Athena's case. Kara had given her nothing. All Athena knew was her age, her occupation, and a rough estimation of how deep her financial accounts ran due to the amounts that she was paid. She had never been curious about a client's personal information until she met Kara, who was an undeniable enigma. She began with what she thought were the most basic questions, such as her home world, how she became a merc and if she had family. The answer she was receiving now was the same one she always got – Silence.

She wasn't going to chase answers, so she shifted to something that had been on her mind ever since Kara said it earlier in the night, "You're funny when you're drunk. You told me that you have two birthdays."

Athena couldn't see it, but Kara's eyebrows flared. She finally blurted something out, but somehow found a little comfort in the fact that it took half of the district's alcohol supply to get her to that point. A simple "uh-huh" was all Kara could mutter in reply, letting it out in a tone that didn't help in getting Athena off her case.

"That was just drunk talk, no?" Athena asked. Silence, again, only this time it was more telling than any words Kara could have given her. "Kara, you're not serious. Two birthdays? How does that work?"

Trying not to say too much was one of Kara's great challenges in the earlier stages of her life. It was only in the latter half that she realised how much more difficult it was to not say anything at all. "One for the day I was born, the other for the day I… the day I landed on the planet where I lived for most of my life," she murmured, her hazy mind finally deciding to give Athena a bone to chew on.

"And where was that?"

Kara snapped. "What's with all the fucking questions? What happened to 'staying out of your client's personal life'?" she replied, having no desire to let Athena in any further.

"It's different with you, Kara," Athena coolly replied.

"Why?"

"I don't know. From the first day we met, there's a part of me that's just always seen you as something akin to a friend."

"I don't pay you to be my friend, I pay you to fuck me," Kara spat out, "I'm just a regular client who needs to get off, nothing more."

"Regular client, huh?" Athena scoffed, "Regular clients don't give me their guns so that I can stay safe when I leave their place. Regular clients don't lie down next to me after a fuck and teach me swear words in different languages, and they definitely don't pay me five times my premium charge for no reason."

"Are you done?" Kara abruptly asked, having become irritated with Athena for doing nothing other than telling the truth.

Kara's tone made it abundantly clear that the conversation would end here, and Athena had no qualms about that. They'd both gotten all they needed out of tonight. "Yeah, just about."

"I need to get some sleep. You should probably get going."

"Sure… Can I shower quickly before I go?" Athena asked as she rose from the bed.

"You know you don't have to ask that," Kara replied, slightly confused that she was requesting permission for something she'd done countless times before.

"I know."

Having regained some strength, Kara rose from the bed to open the balcony door, stepping out and allowing the humid Zuestean breeze to brush over her naked body. After leaving Earth, she expected to go to places that looked nothing like Earth and shared nothing with it in terms of culture and custom. She did, but such places were less common than one would think. She would come to find out that many things were literally universally shared across societies. The unholy trinity of them had become Kara's favourites – Alcohol, prostitutes, and smoking. She'd indulged in the first two tonight, and now it was time for the third. She opened her box of smokes, lighting one up and inhaling before she leaned against the railing.

Her head dropped and she shut her eyes for a moment, becoming stuck in her own mind again. She hadn't lived to be happy in years, rather only to be distracted from the pain and misery. When the alcohol couldn't do that, she turned to Athena, who could send her to another realm with just the use of her tongue. Kara's place was the furthest Athena travelled out of the city's affluent area where she did most of her work, being an exception in that way. But that wasn't the only way Kara was an exception, as Athena had pointed out.

What she said was true. Kara didn't behave like a regular client. She did give Athena firearms to defend herself. She did essentially pillow-talk with her and always pay her fee multiple times over. Her reason for doing so was abundantly clear even though she tried to deny it. It was the same reason why she transferred extra funds to Zax for the damage to the bar and why she never took contracts which required the murder of an innocent person. Despite how cynical and desolate she'd become, despite how hard she'd tried to leave behind everything that was her time on Earth, there was still that part of her that remained. The part that stood for hope, help and compassion. She tried to reduce her identity to that of Kara Zor-El, the intergalactic mercenary, but deep beneath all of that still remained Kara Danvers, the woman who fought for justice… Supergirl.

Part of her could look back at her time on Earth fondly. There were countless happy memories and fulfilling relationships. After losing her entire home world, she found a new place with new people who made life worth living. Alex, Eliza, Nia, Lena, James, Barry, Kal, Oliver, Sara, Lois… there were too many to name off the top of her head. There wasn't a better group of people one could have chosen to give you a new sense of fulfilment and joy in life… temporarily. Because that was the difference between her and most of them. They were mortal. They were human. She wasn't. It was around 2035 when she had to start confronting that fact, when their hairs started to grey and skin started to wrinkle while she looked identical to the day she'd first met all of them. Death was inevitable for them and Kara was aware of that, but that couldn't prevent a piece of her heart from being ripped out each time one of them was buried.

One by one, she watched most of them age out, become weak and perish. Oliver Queen was the first of them to go from natural causes in 2056. After spending nearly three decades of his life fighting all kinds of threats, he'd accrued an incredible amount of brain trauma. The signs of CTE started when he was only 51 as his short-term memory started wilting. Then came the slurring of speech, tremors and long-term memory loss. Early-onset Alzheimer's ate away at his brain function, rendering him bed-ridden and useless by the time he passed away. It always seemed unfair to Kara that the greatest strategist and thinker of them all lost his life to a disease that stripped him of his very ability to do those two things. By the time he passed, they had become strangers to him as he could only recognise his son, William.

James was next in 2063. Then Lois and Kelly in 2068. Sara in 2072. Nia in 2079. Lena in 2081. The final straws came for her the very next year in 2082. With J'onn and Brainy having long since returned to their respective homes in Mars and the 31st century, Barry and Kal were all that were left of Earth's original protectors, the last of Earth's heroes and the last of her friends. Both succumbed to old age after losing their powers. Kal had lost his powers a few decades prior after being exposed to gold kryptonite engineered by Lex Luthor. Barry's case was… complicated. While being a speedster with a healing factor, he was still susceptible to taking damage faster than he could heal from it. That was exactly what happened in 2078 when his spine was snapped in half in a battle with Gorilla Grodd. She didn't know the exact science behind it but losing his ability to run meant that his connection to the Speed Force slowly dwindled. His powers were what kept him young and without them, he aged forty years in the span of four. She laid them both to rest in the same week and it was then that she knew there was nothing left for her on Earth.

That was almost everyone… almost. There was one death that she exhausted all of her willpower in trying to forget, an impossible task given that it was the one that had hurt her the most. Not a single day passed by where Kara didn't think of Alex. It never took more than five minutes after waking for a thought of Alex to pop into her head. She had lost Krypton, her entire homeworld when she was just 13, and she never thought it would be possible to experience despair like that again until the person who had become her whole world died.

Unlike the others, Alex didn't die of old age. She didn't get the chance to live for 80 or 90 years with the woman she loved, raise her children, meet her grandchildren, and then enter an eternal rest with her family by her side.

She was murdered in cold blood.

2031. Maxwell Lord's hate for aliens and specifically Kryptonians had reached a point where he was becoming a threat to the security of every alien in the United States. It was meant to just be another Friday for Kara. She spent the day at CatCo, hovered above National City for a few hours and then returned to her apartment in the late evening. A delivery box had been dropped off for her earlier. "Strange, but whatever," she remembered thinking of it. She changed out of her supersuit, switched on the coffee maker and grabbed a knife to unseal the box. The naïve side of her fantasised about all the better things it could be. A gift from a friend or a love note from an admirer. She couldn't ever have possibly been more wrong. The box held a gun and just as she opened it, her phone received a live video transmission from a blocked number.

It was Maxwell Lord, brandishing a katana next to a gagged, deteriorating Alex. It had taken him several years, but he'd finally figured out her identity, and her sister was paying for it. She knew Lord was incredibly resourceful and cunning but finding a way to take the DEO director hostage was something else entirely. He explained that the gun sent to her was loaded with a single Kryptonite bullet and issued her a simple ultimatum: Take the gun and shoot herself in the head or watch Alex die. She first tried to plead with him, attempting to reason and negotiate a way out of the predicament, but there was no way out. So, Kara did what anyone would do for the person they loved the most… She put the gun to her head and pulled the trigger.

That was supposed to be it, but Maxwell Lord had lied. The supposed "Kryptonite bullet" was just a blank. He heartily laughed as he watched Kara's face become painted with confusion first, then shock before a subtle switch to fear. His next words still chilled Kara's bones to this day – "Thank you, but I'm just going to kill her anyway."

The transmission immediately cut after that, not giving Kara the chance to get another word in. In a state of disbelief, despair, fury and worry all at once, Kara flew out of her apartment faster than she had ever flown in her life. She had no idea where to go and no idea where to look, but her five senses worked overdrive in trying to find any kind of clue. That turned out to be an impediment to her. She was too erratic to process anything, let alone the thousands of smells and millions of voices flooding her mind. Eventually, she got a lock on Alex's heartbeat, but it was nothing like how she'd become used to hearing it. The rhythm was off-tempo and the beats were slowing down… It was fading, and so was Alex.

Kara found herself in the Lord Technologies building on one of the middle floors. It was completely restricted, sealed off from the rest of the building. Kara flew straight in, bursting through concrete walls with ease as she landed in the room where she felt the heartbeat was coming from. Lord had already escaped, but Kara could make out the unmistakable silhouette of Alex's body on the floor. She ran over, turning Alex to face her, but it was already too late. An ungodly amount of blood pooled on the floor, having all spurted out from the large gash across Alex's throat. Her lifeless eyes stared back at Kara, who could do nothing but remove the piece of tape over her mouth, cradle her body and cry. Cry until tears of blood started to run down her cheeks.

When Kara didn't come into CatCo the next day, Nia tried calling her to no answer. She checked her apartment to find only the gun. Becoming increasingly worried, she contacted Barry and Clark to let them know that Kara was nowhere to be seen. 17 hours passed by the time Barry finally located her, speeding over to find Kara still on her knees in that room, still cradling Alex's body in her arms.

"I promise you, Kara, we're going to do everything in our power to bring that son of a bitch to justice," Barry told her later that day. She appreciated the support, she really did, but he was mistaken. Kara didn't want justice. She wanted vengeance. She wanted to kill him, and she knew that Barry, Clark and frankly none of her friends would ever allow her to do that. None, except Oliver Queen. She hadn't said a word to anyone in those few days after Alex's murder except him. He gave the usual words of support and compassion, but he recognised the state she was in all too well. For the first time in his life, he looked at Kara and saw a reflection instead of an antithesis, so he dropped the formalities and became candid with her.

"You want to kill him, don't you?" he bluntly asked.

"Yes," Kara replied with disdain.

"If need be, I'll help you do it. But I have to warn you, Kara, once you take your first life, there's no coming back from that."

In the end, she chose not to drag Oliver into it and ended up not needing his help anyway. She tracked Lord down in just four days by herself and proceeded to do exactly what she planned to, without hesitation. She ripped an arm off first, then snapped a leg in half. She punched a hole through his chest, ripping his heart out and crushing it in her hand. The last life he had would've faded away less than thirty seconds after that, but that wasn't enough for her. She wanted more. In those last few seconds where he still had consciousness, she wrapped her hands around his head, slowly squeezing until it was crushed into nothing more than a jumbled pile of fleshy goo. That was the first murder she ever committed, the first time she had ever killed in cold blood.

And just a few seconds after she'd gotten what she wanted, Oliver's warning started to ring in her head. She met him again a couple of days after and it was the first thing he brought up.

"Was it worth it?" he asked.

"Yes," Kara replied as confidently as she could. But Oliver saw through the mask she was putting on. He saw that she had been changed forever and simply pulled her in for a tight hug.

It was never the same after that. The biggest misconception about losses is that you eventually get over them. That couldn't be further than the truth. In the end, the best you can hope for is just to be able to live with them. She was never as happy or bubbly as she used to be, but she found a way to be just enough of both with the people that remained in her life. Then, they started going too and it became too much to handle. Alex's death changed her forever, and Maxwell Lord's murder at the hands of Supergirl sparked a series of events that would change Earth's relationship with aliens forever.

Lord had been tight with anti-alien government officials for quite some time, pouring millions of dollars into their campaigns. There had always been a tumultuous relationship between aliens and humans, but Lord's death was the ammunition that those in power needed to widen the divide to levels never seen before. They portrayed him as a saint and lauded him as a martyr of the human race. Aliens started to become second-rate citizens, facing systemic oppression that all but took any semblance of freedom they had. A few years later, Clark would fail to stop a chemical attack from killing thousands in Chicago and the conversation would then fully shift over to heroes as well. The working partnership between governments and heroes slowly deteriorated, and laws were passed that prohibited their activities unless they were under full supervision and control.

Clark and Barry aimed for a compromise, but she and Oliver had none of it. They worked from the shadows, trying to do whatever they could when a situation arose before inevitably having to flee and shake government agents off their tail. The humans staunchly believed that their right to self-determination had been taken away by the very existence of superpowered beings and they were hell-bent on taking it back, no matter the method. Even though that kind of philosophy would end up driving their societies further into the gutter, they hardly cared. The Earth that she'd grown up with was vastly different from the one that she left in 2082. Heroes were gone. Most metahumans and aliens lived in hiding if they hadn't sold their souls to work for their oppressors. The place that had once welcomed her with open arms cast her out into the cosmos, never to return.

Leaving proved more difficult than she expected at first. While she was the last of her kind, her closest friends still lived on through their children. Nora and Bart West-Allen, William Clayton, and her nephews, Jordan and Jonathan Kent. Maybe, she thought, she had to stick around for them because she owed just that much to their parents. After everything that they'd done for her, the very least she could do was keep a watchful eye over their children in a world that was now hostile towards them. Even more importantly, her niece was still alive. Esme was the last tangible piece of Alex still present in her life and because of that, Kara emotionally held onto her with the grip of an anaconda. But in the end, it was actually Esme who convinced her to leave. Kara pleaded a case for staying behind, but Esme reminded her that she no longer had any obligation to. She had given everything to planet Earth while it had taken everything away from her.

"You're still here. And if you're still here, I want to be here until…" Kara remembered telling Esme.

"You've been to enough funerals, Kara. I don't want you to have to go through being at mine."

And that was all Kara needed to hear to accept that it was time to leave. This funeral would be the one to fully break her. She had buried Alex, and to bury her daughter would be like burying her all over again. That, she wouldn't be able to handle, and so she left the planet within the next week.

It was now 115 years since her sister's death, but she remembered it like it was yesterday. She could still smell the distinct scent of Alex's blood and feel her body becoming colder and colder in her arms. If she wanted to, she could even weep now like how she did that day, but she held most of it back. Just a lone tear rolled down her cheek as she took the last drag of her cig, which she'd smoked right down to the filter. She hadn't fully satisfied her craving yet, so she flicked the spent one away before lighting another.

She'd lost everyone and everything that had ever meant something to her. She refused to get too close to anyone should she have to go through the pain of losing someone she cared about again. Here she was, wandering from planet to planet, making money by doing people's dirty work for them. Besides herself, she had literally nothing and no one to live for. And if so, then what was even the point of living?

She thought about suicide before, multiple times. She could definitely find a weapon powerful enough to blast her head off. She'd passed by solar systems with red suns before, even done jobs on planets where she didn't have her powers. There was nothing to stop her from flying into a red sun if she wanted to.

But for some damn reason, she hadn't done it yet. If someone were to ask her why, she couldn't give an answer. For some reason unbeknownst to her, she was still alive. Living a life barely worth living, yes, but living nonetheless. Perhaps there was a greater purpose behind her still being here. Perhaps she wasn't done with this world yet even though she wanted to be.

Or perhaps, she simply didn't have the guts to end her own life and was waiting for someone else to do it for her.


Kara became lightheaded as an awful taste of dirt entered her mouth again. She'd smoked her second cig right down to the filter as well. With a flick of her wrist, she sent it away and walked back into her room, closing the balcony door behind her. Athena was already fully dressed, having finished her shower, and was gathering the last of her belongings as she readied to leave.

"When would you like to meet again?" she asked as she zipped up her jacket.

"I don't know. I'll let you know," Kara replied.

"Sure." Athena turned and was halfway out the room door before Kara called to her.

"Hey… Be careful, okay?"

Athena nodded with a smile, before stepping out and going on her way. Kara climbed atop her bed, sliding under sheets and adjusting the pillow so that it sat perfectly below her head. As she closed her eyes hoping to enter a deep sleep, she wondered how sweet and easy it would be if she just didn't wake up tomorrow.

But she did, and so began another day living a life not worth living.