(Getting to Know) Your Inner Child

by XavAcid

Chapter 7 : ... and we survived another day.

Kara woke up extra early.

And she felt absolutely exhausted. Not even the yellow sunlight shining through the large window could make her feel less tired.

It was entirely unfair that caffeine did not work on her, and was envious of Alex when the older Danvers could just chuck a cup of coffee and be fully awake, at least until the caffeine wore off. Kara could drink a whole gallon of it and had no effect. All it would do was take up her precious sticky buns space in her belly. Not cool.

Although, if Alex was here, or rather if she was her usual, lovably grumpy self, she would probably tell her that it was all in her head. A Kryptonian under the yellow sun would get her power restored quickly enough that she wouldn't feel any exhaustion at all when she exerts herself, if she even exerted herself enough to make a dent in that endless store of energy. That was not something that happened very often, usually, but not lately. It seemed running after a five year old, and Ms. Grant, and keeping the city safe took a lot out of her usually endless reserve.

With a silent groan - mindful of the tiny body nestled against her side - Kara slipped out of the cover to start her day. Normally she would still be in bed for at least another half an hour to give herself time to slowly wake up. She had super speed, she only needed a minute or so for her morning routine. But with little Alex her super speed didn't matter much, she could only hurry along the little one so much before it all came to a screeching halt, she already found that out the hard way.

Besides, while she could stuff her face and fly at the same time if she needed to, but that wasn't a good idea -who knew insects could fly that high, little Alex couldn't do the same. Lest she choke in mid air. And despite what Ms. Grant liked to think, Kara knew that donut wasn't a breakfast food fit for a five year old.

Within minutes, Kara finished her morning routine and was ready to wake little Alex, and hopefully they could get through the morning with minimal whining, and no tears.

As gentle as she'd learned to be over the time since she'd arrived at the Danvers house until this moment, Kara picked up Alex, smiling to herself when small arms wrapped themselves around her neck, black halloween bats patterned pajamas askew. 'Here we go.'

After a few minutes of half awake Alex pretending she was a wet noodle, the morning went surprisingly smooth, and before long they were gathering their things - books and tablet and notebook, some coloring stuff for little Alex in a backpack, a little 3D printed cat fresh off the build plate - and out the door they went.

"Kara," Winn nudged his friend while keeping his eyes on their boss in her office.

"What?" The Kryptonian didn't even bother looking away from her screen.

"Your phone kept vibrating." He gestured at her half closed drawer, where he could hear the buzzing sound. He'd heard her phone going on and off for a while now and wondering why his friend didn't bother answering the phone.

"Yeah, I know."

"Why aren't you answering it?"

Kara turned her panic eye on him and shook her head. "No, no, that's Eliza."

Winn eyed his friend with a confused expression, he often heard about how Alex didn't really talk to her mom all that much, and Kara would make up for that by calling her once a week. He had never seen his friend ignoring a call before.

"She's been calling and texting." Kara whispered out of the side of her mouth.

"Then you should answer the phone, or text her, you're not that busy." Winn tilted his head, then it dawned on him.. Oh right, Alex.

"She's been calling Alex's phone, too. I don't know what to tell her."

"Can't you tell her Alex was on assignment or something?" He offered, with both his eyes on their boss, still. "I mean, she works for the D.E.O I'm pretty sure there were times she had to be incommunicado."

The look on Kara's face told him that she didn't even think about that excuse, though he was pretty sure she wouldn't be able to pull it off anyway. She was such a bad liar, he didn't even know how she kept her Supergirl persona a secret. It seemed like everyone who knew her would inevitably find out about it anyway.

On that note though, he was pretty sure he was the only one she told intentionally. He was quite proud of that fact.

Before she could say anything their Boss loudly called out "Kiera!"

With a sort of relief sigh, Kara shot her friend a look and rushed into their Boss's office.

"Yes, Ms. Grant?"

Her boss didn't even look up from the report on her desk, Kara could see a small, 3D printed cat right next to her pen cup, and her eyes glanced over to little Alex, who was busily playing with the phone… wait, that was Alex's phone. When did she get the phone? Last she remembered it was on the kitchen counter, where she left it last night after ignoring a bunch of calls from Eliza.

Her little fingers were flying over the bottom half of the screen, and Kara could tell that she was texting. And how was it still working? She didn't charge it all and as far as she could recall, Alex didn't charge it the day of the incident, either. So, how? A quick glance outside told her that it wasn't Winn. Then who?

She was freaking out, internally, did little Alex text Eliza? What did she say, did she tell her…. What …

"Keira!"

The sharp tone from her boss made her jump a little, at least she had enough control to not go through the roof. That would be really really bad. She certainly would never be able to explain a big hole in the ceiling away as easi- well, she would never be able to explain it and still claim to be human. - And Ms. Grant was glaring at her…

Cat had been looking down at the screen of her laptop, while giving a list of things that she needed Sunny Danvers to get done, there were so many things to do and… it seemed her assistant was distracted.

Privately, she couldn't blame Sunny Danvers from being distracted, especially when she saw where half of her attention went. Little Alex was cute, and with concentration on her little face. She made Cat miss Carter when he was at this age. Hack, for a tiny little sliver of time she wanted to have another child, a daughter, if she could get someone even close to little Alex. Imagine what she could do once she grew up.

But she digressed.

Now.. Sunny Danvers.

"Yes, Ms. Grant. Proof from photography, articles from Snapper," she quickly rattled off the 'to do' list. "Is there anything else?"

"And get me coffee."

"Of course." Kara turned to leave, but her eyes were still on little Alex, who was leaning forward, as if she wanted to go with her. And she probably did.

J'onn thought he understood most of human actions and emotions, and came close to doing all of them at one time or another. Except the hair pulling thing, he'd never come close to doing it, until he'd met Alex, and then Kara.

But the last couple of days, well…

Another buzz of his phone went off, he didn't even have to look to know who messaged him. This happened with increasing frequency through the day for the past couple of days.

He got a report from Dr. Hamilton and Supergirl that Alex seemed to regain some of her adult-self in short bursts, although it seemed to last longer each day, her body, however, did not seem to change at all.

Right now he allotted as many personnel that had even a little bit of experience or skill sets that relevance to the problem at hand. He had been giving his second in command more and more responsibilities lately that he almost forgot how much work it took to run the DEO smoothly. Alex had been carrying almost half of his usual load of work and now that she wasn't available, he was feeling all his years combined bearing down on his shoulders.

Urgh!

Dr. Wells had a theory, and if they could not find anything they might get to see if her theory was correct, but he hoped they would find something sooner than that. They didn't know what- if any- kind of psychological effect this was going to have on his agent. They also did not want to find out what all of this was going to do to their resident Knyptonian.

Alex had always been Kara's constant, she was the rock, and anchor for the Kryptonian to ground herself. At the moment, their resident super was fine, she was busy taking care of her little charge, for now. He didn't want to think about what was going to happen next if things did not go the way they wanted.

His phone buzzed again.

J'onn had the urge to bang his head into the nearest wall.

His small grunt of frustration made a group of agents that was nearby give him a wide burt.

Little Alex saw texts coming in, several since this morning. It was listed as 'Mom', while she kind of miss her mom, she didn't feel like she should answer any of the text, not without telling Kara first. Something nickling in the back of her mind and it was telling her that it would not be a good idea.

In the meantime, she texted J'onn. Yup, J'onn she could text.

"What are you doing, sweetie?"

Her head snapped up to see Cat's green eyes on her.

"Um.. reading."

"Weren't you reading on the tablet?" Cat just looked suspicious. Not that she thought that a five year old could be doing something nefarious, but a child as smart as little Alex seemed to be, there was a possibility that she could be getting into something on the phone and data could be lost. She didn't even know who this particular phone belonged to.

"Yes, but I wanna look up some animals." Little Alex said quickly, her little fingers were typing. "Willy Wonka was talking about Vermicious Knids, I wanna know what they look like."

At that, Cat gave a small laugh. "Oh honey, I don't think that existed in the real world." When the little girl looked up at her with a frown, Cat quickly continued, "but there might be some pictures from the movie."

Little Alex looked down at the phone again, little crinkle between her brown still there. "There's a movie?" Of course, there was a movie, she knew that!

"Oh dear," Cat murmured. "Of course there is, Carter liked it, but he said he preferred the book. His favorite was Matilda."

"I like The Witches." Little Alex looked up at Cat, "have you seen the movie?" She'd seen the movie, was it last night? Before? She wasn't sure, but she did see the movie.

"No, I haven't." Cat shook her head affectionately, she didn't even know there was a movie. Not that she had the time to be paying attention to things like these beyond professional interests, and Carter.

"I like the book better, but the movie was still fun." Then she turned her big hazel eyes on Cat, all innocent like. "Do you think Carter will like it?"

Cat Grant smiled and told her that they could certainly ask Carter if he would like to watch and maybe they could have a little playdate, then she left the five year old to her devices and got back to work.

Little Alex went right back to texting J'onn, and then Kara to bring her back some cookies. A double chocolate chip cookie. Maybe two.

By the afternoon after she ran back from photography for the third time, Kara'd wished that the day would end quickly. She was tired, and stressed out, time seemed to be crawling by. Even more than the previous day where the work in the office was pretty close to normal and her Supergirl rescues were a little less busy. A couple of accidents here and there, some kittens and snakes stuck on the trees, nothing very intense, one alien incident and that was about it. Today, though, it seemed that people were more reckless in their driving, an accidental fire, and a convenient store robbery. Ms. Grant'd already given her stink eye once, she didn't need anymore of it. At least not today.

It was three in the afternoon and she wished they could just go home already. She wasn't even going to go into the D.E.O. today, unless there was some sort of significant development, in that case she would be right over immediately. Dinner and a movie with little Alex never sounded so good. She'd even invite Winn along, even if that meant he and little Alex would be geeking out together and fiddle with the printer for hours.

In that case, she could catch a nap, before inevitably, more supergirl's duties call. She really really needed a nap. Stress tired her out even more than carrying a plane. Things seemed to slow down at the same time, and only when she didn't need them to, which was so unfair.

Although, she caught a few 'Carter' here and there from the fishbowl of an office that belong to her boss, so she could foresee a playdate in the near future, seeing how they had their heads together - little Alex and Carter - the other day as they looked at some 3D models. She wondered if young Mr. Grant would make an appearance today.

Probably not, she decided, but one could never be sure.

Kara decided earlier today to use her power to get things done faster,and if Alex knew she would definitely be getting a stern lecture,but Alex wasn't here - the grown up version of her - Rao, she would sit through whatever lecture if it would mean she got her Alex back to normal. She missed cuddling with her. Cuddling with little Alex was nice, but it was hardly the same. She missed being the little spoon, missed kisses and hugs. Alex gave the best hugs.

And like she could sense it, little Alex ran to her and threw both arms around her in a big hug.

Kara felt tears sting the back of her eyes.

"Hi," the little girl said with a big smile.

"Hi," really, she was too cute for words. "What are you doing?"

"Nothing," but she draped her small body across the Kryptonian's lap and reached into the bottom drawer of Kara's desk, where she kept her snacks. She wanted to roll her eyes, but decided to just pull her back. Not stopping her exactly, but slowed her down.

"Alex." She tried to sound firm.

Alex's little face smiled up at her. "You know you're not supposed to eat anymore candy." She had three cookies and a milkshake already, Kara didn't need her to bounce off the wall until midnight. Or throw up, throwing up would be very, very bad.

"Just one milk candy." Alex pouted up at her, a piece of candy in white and red wrapper in her little hand. Oh boy, now she knew what it was like to be on the receiving end of the pout, she was going to curve the urge the next time she wanted to do it to Alex, her Alex… grown up Alex.

"Fine." A reply came with a long, long sigh.

But little Alex didn't wait for it, instead she popped the milky white candy into her mouth even before the air expelled from the Kryptonian's lungs completely, regardless that her lungs had much much larger capacity than human, it was still fast.

Then little Alex hopped away back into Cat's office, presumably so that Kara wouldn't stop her from eating another candy she had in her hand.

Sneaky, sneaky… how did Eliza survive when Alex was little, she would love to know.

Dr. Wells put in the request for data from the Warehouse several days earlier and they were only just now receiving it. She supposed it couldn't be helped since Warehouse 13 was no more. Though she was sure that another one was going to popup to replace the destroyed one sooner or later. In the meantime it was such a pain to get someone who could help. Someone with the access still.

Not to mention whatever redtapes that they needed to go through when communicating between secret organizations. It was a wonder her request for data was even approved at all, let alone with a quick result like this.

And it was just in time, too. They were finishing up what they could with what they had on the D.E.O. database. The artifacts that the Alpha team acquired earlier seemed to have powered down, and none of them could seem to meet the requirement for it to power back up. If only they could ask Agent Danvers about it. Even then Dr. Wells couldn't be sure even the Agent herself knew.

In any case, they had no way of asking now that the Agent herself was a five year old.

A very intelligent, very adorable five year old.

HG herself had the pleasure of spending a few precious minutes with her a couple of days ago when Supergirl brought her in for a checkup with Dr. Hamilton. She looked adorable in her skeleton hoodie and jogger with her high top sneakers.

At this point the fact that the D.E.O second in command was a child was unknown, the majority of the agents didn't know the details, or really what was going on, but they certainly knew that something's happened. After all, Agent Danvers was a fixture, and suddenly she was gone for days now. At least those that man the command center would definitely know something was up. And like any secret organization, the longer the absent, the rumor was going to fly.

And also Supergirl carrying an adorable five year old into the base was also something that did not happen everyday. Or ever. Who was babysitting Agent Danvers while Supergirl was working, she wondered, because they all knew Supergirl had her day job, no one knew where she was working, with the exception of Agent Danvers and Director Henshaw. Well, wherever that was, they must have a very good daycare. Or a very nice boss.

Dr. Wells stretched her back, deciding to read through the report after she foraged for a cup of coffee. Eyeing the stack of paper, and several tablets; much better than what she remembered from her Warehouse day - dusty tombs, she decided that a cup was probably not going to be enough. A whole pot sounded a whole lot better. And Dr. HG Wells prepared herself for another all-nighter. Myka wasn't going to be very happy about this.

With little Alex's arms wrapped tight around her neck, and two boxes of pizza in her hand, Kara wrangled all of them through the door of her apartment, she gave her steps a slight bounce just so she could hear the tinkling sound of Alex's giggles as she held on like a koala.

Winn might be joining them later, but he mentioned something about his long standing gaming session with his online buddies. In short, he probably was not going to make it tonight. It was fine, either way, if he didn't show up then she'd get to spend time with Alex. Something that she didn't get to do at all today, Ms. Grant was hogging the little girl the entire day. Must be something about Alex, adult or child. Personally, though, Kara thought Alex was the best thing since potstickers, so she couldn't blame her boss for wanting to hog her.

Once Kara put her down little Alex bounced into the apartment and headed right for the kitchen. So much like big Alex would do - she always went for something to drink from the fridge, and usually it was a beer - she didn't get drunk, so the Kryptonian never commented on it. Once the plates were out and pizza was distributed, a piece for Alex for a start - Kara wanted her to eat before starting on a new model that she wanted - and four for herself, she was also a growing Kryptonian, she needed fuel.

The two Danvers' settled in front of the tv, because little Alex wanted to watch a movie while they ate. Just as she was about to go for her fifth piece of pizza her phone rang again. She didn't have to look to know that it was her adoptive mother calling. Eliza'd been calling on and off for most of the afternoon and only taper off in the last couple of hours. Kara didn't know if she should answer the phone or not, during her indecision, little face looked up at her with an eyebrow raised in question.

She supposed it was best to just get it over with. Least Eliza hopped in the car and drove to National City, or worse: called J'onn. Kara could only imagine that scenario, and it wasn't good. So, she gathered up what courage she had within herself and picked up the phone.

"Hi, Eliza."

a/n : It's a short one, but took so, so long. I've been indecisive and it showed. Anyone miss little Alex? Do you think Eliza should show up for a couple of days to babysit? How's everyone doing? Everyone's healthy, I hope. I've been working less, but none stop if that make sense. In any case, thank you for reading. Comments and favs are very much appreciated. Any mistakes are mine.