Note: Written for the tumblr prompt: "Supercorp Gods and Godesses AU where they're gods from different Pantheons just kinda livin ordinary lives"
Lena snuck into the barn, following the delicious smell of freshly turned dung. There was a bag of compost in the corner, blessedly opened. She dug her fingers in, rubbing the rich, crumbly matter between them, sinking her hands in up to the wrists. She'd have stuck her face in, too, but she had makeup on.
"Oh, hey," said a surprised but friendly voice. A voice belonging to a surprised but friendly woman in denim overalls over a red flannel shirt and a pair of bulky leather gloves. "Um. Did you want to borrow some compost?"
Thus, Lena found herself sat in Kara Danvers' kitchenette, a to-go trash bag full of compost beside her, scrutinizing the dirt under her fingernails while they waited for water to boil.
"I don't blame you, I make it myself," Kara Danvers told her happily. "Veeery luxurious. Premium crap. You know, literally."
Lena scraped some gunk from under her thumbnail, refrained from popping it in her mouth.
"You farm?" Kara prompted hopefully.
Lena grunted noncommittally.
"Uh, garden?"
She silently flicked another speck of dirt onto Kara's floor.
"Oh." Kara seemed a little lost. "Uhh?"
I'm the immortal goddess of fungi , Lena might have told her. I've furnished this earth with an entire kingdom of fantastic, industrious life. That I'm neither needed nor remembered anymore is an oversight and a travesty not lightly forgiven.
But that would have sounded silly. "I like the smell," she admitted quietly.
"Oh! Yeah?" That got Kara's attention. "Thank you! I make it myself. Did you know 40% of our trash is compostable? And that's not counting all the poop. I don't think it smells bad when it's done, either. And it's great to turn something worthless into something useful."
I know, Lena thought. I made the little ones who make that possible.
"How do you like your tea, then? Let me guess. Milk? No, something fermented." Kara's eyes lit up. "I have just the thing. Hold on. Why did I even boil water?" She picked the kettle off the gas with her bare hands and placed it on the countertop. She didn't yelp in pain, so Lena supposed humans must have evolved some since she'd last thought to check.
Kara took a large container out of the fridge, poured some amber liquid into a glass and placed it in front of Lena.
"Homemade kombucha," Kara informed her proudly. "I grow my own culture. Don't worry, I treat them super well."
Lena held the glass in both hands, rubbing over it with a thumb. She couldn't drink this, but she was proud of them. "I can tell," she told Kara.
Kara made a little sound. Her body brushed Lena's shoulder as she slid back into the chair across from her, clutching her own glass of kombucha.
Lena scrutinized her. Highlighting the frizzy hairs that had escaped from Kara's ponytail, blurring the delineation of her hands, clashing horribly with the blue of her denim, was a strange, persistent red glow.
"You're glowing."
Kara patted at her hair as if she might physically feel her halo. "Oh, you've noticed? Haha, yeah, a little bit."
"Why?"
Kara rubbed the side of her glowing neck with a glowing hand. "Well, I'm a little bit dead sun god? Uh, dead sun god's cousin, really. But… very dead, very far away. Not a danger to you or anything."
Lena looked at Kara's face, nervous and pretty and ordinary; at her body, solid and garishly dressed and wreathed in otherworldly light. Lena nodded to herself. She held up her palm, where some of the foundation had rubbed off, revealing chalky, mottled skin, and allowed a handful of amanita muscaria to spring forth. Their caps were spotted and bright, her most crowd-pleasing trick.
Kara stared at Lena's palm, mouth slack with either delight or dismay, Lena would guess. "Mushroom?" Kara choked out. "Mushroom god?"
Not entirely accurate, but Lena nodded anyway.
Kara let out the brightest, wildest sound Lena had ever heard. "Can you believe this? I've never met another one! What are the odds? And you're-Ah! I could make sunlight for you!"
"Fungi do not photosynthesize," Lena informed her. "But thank you."
Kara's glow had intensified during the course of their conversation to the point where it now doused the entire kitchenette in warm, gentle light. Lena wondered idly as to its significance.
"Can I touch?" Kara asked, her voice grown subdued. Her light pulsed around her like a living tissue.
"Mhm," said Lena, and held her hand steady as Kara's fingers reached for it.
Kara brushed a single fingertip over the largest amanita cap, pressure so light it was barely felt. Lena shivered anyway. Kara pressed down, gently testing elasticity, and stroked the side of her finger down the stem. When she brought the pad of her thumb up to rub along the tender gills, Lena dropped her hand away, unable to bear the touch any longer.
"Wow," Kara murmured. "That was… yeah. Wow."
Lena watched her, observed as a red flush spilled across her skin to match the red light emanating from it.
Abruptly, Kara stood up. "Would you like to stay for dinner?" she blurted. "Also, important question, if you had a pizza, could you put mushrooms on it? They charge, like, 1.50 per topping, you know. Hold on, I'm ordering us a few extra large with cheese."
Kara had already pulled out her phone, and the room was now as red as a hygrocybe coccinea cap, and Lena, more importantly, didn't want to say no. So she stayed for dinner.