He was standing in a plaza on a bright, sunny day, staring at the floating metal statue.
He turned to the colorfully clad blonde girl next to him and spoke. "You've contributed a lot to this world, Kara, and they've decided to thank you with this, a tribute to you, where your rocket landed so many years ago..." He smiled with pride and joy. "This is your day, Supergirl! We all want to thank you, and want you to enjoy it!" She hugs him, with that radiant smile, cheeks rosy with embarrassment at all the attention. "Thank you, everyone! This is absolutely wonderful."
FLASH!
He's speeding through the air, hoping against hope he'll get there in time.
Too late.
The speeding rocket skims the surface, and then buries itself half into the ground. He lands in the silence, and approaches the wreck, as the rocket vents fumes from what was left of its' RCS system. Sad, he thought. The young lady inside couldn't have survived that. She won't be coming out alive! Might as well get her to the Metropolis Coroner...See where she's...she WAS from. He wrenches the hatch open with super-strength...
The young, blonde girl opens her blue eyes and smiles at him, and then stands up, speaking in Kryptonese. "Don't worry, Superman! I'm alive!" She brushes some of the dust from her blue costume, and then looks up at him. She smiles again. "...And apparently, without a scratch!"
"Great Guns! You're unharmed?! You-You must be invulnerable like me to survive that wreck!"
She looks at him, an impish grin on her face, blue eyes sparkling. "Well, I AM from Krypton, just like you...Specifically, from Argo City. "
"That's impossible! I was the only survivor when it exploded 25 years ago."
She clambers, cat-like, to the top of her spacecraft and sits down.
"Well...Uh...Miss...I didn't get your name..."
"Kara Zor-El, Superman."
"Kara, and then. I do have a few questions...Why are you wearing a costume like mine? How did you know my name? How did you know I'm from Krypton?"
"Let me tell you a story. This should clear everything up...
When Krypton exploded, you were not the only one to escape alive..."
He listens to her story, as he uses his x-ray and microscopic visions on her arms and clothing. Very dense skin, muscle fibers and bones. Fabric is a very dense weave...She's definitely not from earth, and neither are the clothes...
Then he senses it. The darkness. Coming for her...
She looks at him and smiles sweetly...
FLASH!
He's following Dr. Light as she weaves through the Anti-Monitor's castle, finally catching up to her.
"Thank Rao you waited."
Kumiko looked at him with a frown. "I'm not stupid, Superman. Those are the machines we're looking for."
"You SURE?"
"I'm a scientist. This is my forte. I'm sure."
He flies into the room, lands on the ground. "Then they have to go. The earths must survive." He strides toward them...as his intuition screams in his head... a second before the most painful blast he's ever known slams into his back. He can't stop it. He screams with pain, as the blast knocks him across the room. As he loses conciousness, he feels the darkness getting closer, and his super-hearing picks up Kara, faintly:
"Ohmigod, KAL?!"
Kara...NO! Stay away...It wants you... He feels the Anti-Monitor approach. He hears rock getting pulverized as Kryptonian skin blasts through it. Getting closer. He feels panic beginning to well up, but he can't move. His arms and legs are lead.
He hears Dr. Light screaming. "...He created me to destroy you. I WILL fufill his wishes!"
There was an energy blast, followed by a short female scream. The gravelly voice speaks again, almost with amusement. "No, you will not."
Damn, I still can't move! His hearing picks out her talking to the others as she rapidly winds her way to him. Reassuring and encouraging. Worried. She's getting closer, he thinks frantically. Sheol, Kara, get OUT of here! Why am I so damn weak? He blinks his eyes and tries to get them to work, frowning. Why is it I can turn coal into diamond, but I can't get my damn body to move?!..
CRASH!!
He hears her as she breaks through the final wall.
"You?! You caused all this madness?!" Anti-Monitor grunts as steel-hard Kryptonian flesh starts to pummel him. He hears her heart beating like a triphammer. "You bastard! All those worlds and universes! All those people! Dead! Gone! How could life mean so little to you?!"
SMACKK! Steel against flesh.
"I shall not tolerate this any longer, girl. You shall NOT touch me again!"
The darkness is now so close he swears he can feel it brush against his arm.
Waiting...
Arrgh...C'mon...c'mon! Move! MOVE!
GET OUT NOW! KARA! NOW!
He woke, sweating.
Catching his breath, he looked at the clock. 2:35. He looked over at Lois, still sleeping soundly, curled up like a cat.
He quietly got out of bed and went out to the living room. He leaned against the corner and looked at Kara, thinking.
That was weird, he thought. I've had detailed dreams before, but none like that. It felt...real.
He silently floated over to the doors to the balcony, opened the door, and sat down on one of the chairs. Is it Dominus? I very RARELY have nightmares like that, that are THAT realistic. Could he have escaped the Phantom Zone? He leaned back, staring up at the moon. Absentmindedly, he cranked up his Super-vision and studied the remains of Apollo 11. Maybe, but what would he gain out of those dreams? Those things never happened. He leaned back, closed his eyes, and focused his super-recall. Reviewed his role in Crisis. Kara wasn't there. She was probably enroute to earth, and then.
The floating statue was interesting, but how could we honor her if she didn't land here yet? Maybe that's from the future?!
The landing was a wonderful sequence. It felt...right...somehow. Very real. He snorted. Yeah, right! it was a Hypertime me and a Hypertime Kara.
He stared at the city in silence.
In the lull, he closed his eyes for a moment...
He hears the alarm in the lab go off.
Professor Bolden was right! The Kryptonite chain reaction CAN'T be controlled. Thank Rao I was prepared! This lead dome should cover the reactor unit...
He moves even faster, with the lead half-dome in his hands.
Just hope I can make it...!
He crashes through the roof over the core.
I-If that radiation gets to me, I'm going to be very dead, very qui--
The green tinted core explodes.
The dome is wrenched full from his grasp, and he's blown out the side of the building, to land on his back in the sand.
Full K exposure...I'm a dead man...
Blackness enfolds him.
He opens his eyes... And looks at the surprised thief, a smile on his face, and he continues.
"...or you're illiterate!"
He grabs the chunk of 'Kryptonite'.
"Always wanted to try this."
He bites into the chunk. Chews. Swallows.
Sees the thief's jaw hit the ground...
Followed by the thief after he hits him with a 'love tap'.
Have to hurry, they're gonna be coming back from commercial soon.
He pauses...rubs his temples. Damn migraine...
"Clark? Clark?"
He opens his eyes.
"Urm...Sorry, hon. Weird dreams. Couldn't sleep."
Lois chuckled. "Seemed to be doing well enough to me!"
The throbbing returned. He rubbed his temples.
Lois looked worried. "Headache?"
He nodded.
"You DON'T get headaches."
He chuckled.
"First time for everything." He got up and held her. Kissed her. She caressed his cheek. "Let's go to bed."
Harbinger was in meditation, focusing on her breathing, when the vision came before her mind's eye:
Rock castle. The explosion through the wall next to her scared her half to death. A calming serenity then came over her and she watched curiously.
She saw the person that just shattered the wall like glass.
A young blonde girl, wearing Superman's colors.
She watched as the enraged girl whipped across the room, heading for...
The Anti-Monitor?!
The girl plowed into him, punching furiously.
She looked around.
The machine room. Of course. Crisis.
There's Superman and Dr. Light.
Looking back, She saw the Anti-Monitor give the...Supergirl?... a savage backhand that sent her tumbling head over heels across the room to land near her.
Everything in the vision slowed to a crawl but her.
She walked over to see who this girl was. Looked into the pained face of...
"K-Kara?"
The face was not quite that of the teenage girl she met, but looked to be in her mid-twenties. The eyes were ice blue, not gray, the hair was more of a platinum blonde...
But it WAS her.
Her body jolted out of meditation and she opened her eyes.
Kara was there?
Like an amnesiac, she ransacked her memories. Parts of the veil from before slowly lifted.
Kara...WAS there! She WAS Supergirl at the time.
Another memory came and she shuddered.
"She died...He...killed her. The Anti-Monitor killed her."
She stared out the window at the starlit sky. But how is she here now? And why couldn't I remember? Out of everyone that was there, Pariah and I alone remembered the infinite earths...I should have remembered something as important as Kara being there and dying. I remembered the Flash's death, why not hers?
Why would a hero be forgotten?
The only response that came to mind was the image of the Super-videotape...
Harbinger was not the only one to remember a girl who never existed in their past.
Barbara Gordon poured the hot water into the cocoa powder and stirred. One HELL of a day, she thought.
That JLA mission to deflect the alien fleet. That required some split second timing in the end, to get Bruce out of their command ship. Clark barely got himself free of the aliens that dogpiled onto him en masse, but once he did, he made a beeline for the bridge, snagged Bruce (who was a bit annoyed at the delay) and beat feet out of there.
The rest of the day was packed to bursting with Gotham work.
A couple of VERY slick drug kingpins, who made the mistake of setting up in Gotham, apparently had computer experts that were almost her level. Almost. Needless to say, they DIDN'T have Bruce. Working with her, the both of them homed in on 'drug central'. Ten minutes later, the Gotham police were summoned. Twenty minutes later, the lackeys ran, panicked, out the front doors to the police...BEGGING to be put away.
She chuckled. Pushing 40, and the man is STILL the best at what he does. And what he does is still not very nice. She shook her head in amusement and stretched her arms out above her head.
The work with Bruce was minor after that.
They tracked down a rapist, a murderer...and that was it for the night.
She yawned and blinked blearily at the screen.
I don't know how the man keeps going. With his appearances both as Bruce Wayne and all his activities as Batman, you'd SWEAR he doesn't sleep!
She wheeled out into the den. She placed her cup on the table, and maneuvered to the couch. A minute and a half later, she snuggled down on the couch with the TV on low, sipping her cocoa. She flipped through the stations.
"...Everyone knows her as Supergirl. Join us as we explore... WITHIN THE HEROES!"
"The first appearance of the Maid of Might can be documented all the way back in October,1988, in Metropolis. She helped..."
There was one...earlier than that, she thought tiredly. She slowly nodded off...
And dreamed of her meeting up with the differently costumed Girl of Steel back in the early 80's. A girl named Kara. This Supergirl had no flame wings, no telekinesis or shunting ability, but every power Superman wielded. She watched in the dream as she made best friends with the orphan from the stars... Until Crisis. Dreaming? she thought. Yes...Where...am I? She became concious and looked around at the stone fortress surrounding her. Watched as Kara, badly hurt and burned, savagely protected an unconcious Superman against a man in heavy battle armor.
I saw this...in the vision...down at the church! That's...the Anti-Monitor! No! I have to watch this AGAIN?!
Dr. Light powers up, speaks. Kara, distracted, turns. "Get out, NOW!"
"You turn on me, Girl? That is a FATAL error!"
Kara, NO! Babs chokes back a scream. She feels her heart rip open with pain as she watches her best friend's death all over again.
His massive hand envelops Kara's head. Kara manages to get out, "Oh, no..." A blast follows that knocks Babs into blackness.
She opens her eyes...And looks down at the speech in her yellow-gloved hands on the podium and continues...
"...but a hero's greatest measure is not power, but the courage they show in living and helping others each day, using the greatest power of all, what's in their heart..."
She sniffed and blinked back bitter tears, feeling the void of her lost friend burn her heart.
She steadied herself and continued. "Supergirl...is a true hero. She, and her sacrifice, will never be forgotten. It lives on in the earths and all the people she saved. As her people were wont to wish at times like this, May…Rao, her god, be…with…"
She pulls away from the podium as the tears blur out the faces of the assembled heroes, and she sags to the stage floor, crying. My God…I can't do this! I should never had agreed to this…It's too much…to soon!
She feels a gentle hand on her shoulder. She wipes her eyes and looks up... At a young, grey-eyed girl in a modern Kryptonian containment suit, smiling down at her. She speaks softly. "No tears, Barbara, you will get to know me again..." Her heart leaps, and shock overtakes her. She feels the world twist sideways as she says, "Kara?!"
She woke with a jolt. "Kara?!"
The haze of waking crept across her mind, leaving fragments. She fought for clarity. What was that? Kara was fighting...The Anti-Monitor? I know I was at a podium...reading a eulogy... her eulogy... She took a sip of her now-cold cocoa and frowned.
Two more pieces came forward from the haze. She saw Kara wearing a strange bodysuit. She said...I'd get to know her AGAIN.
She put her cup aside and got back into her chair. Headed back toward her database. With trembling fingers, she requested a secure uplink to the Fortress computers. C'mon...C'MON! Please...be right! If there is justice up there, PLEASE let me be right! She bit her lower lip nervously. Various passcodes later, she accessed the archives, and then the personnel scans...
And felt her heart pause, as the blood drained from her face.
There, on the screen, was the face that comforted, vindicated... and unnerved her, with grey eyes and all. Underneath, in English and Kryptonese was the simple legend: "Kara Zor-El - Daughter of Zor-El and Alura Zor-El (Inn-Ze)."
She sagged back into her chair in shock and relief.
"She's alive...again...but how?"
One last fragment surfaced. Her. From her speech... "Kara...is a true hero. She, and her sacrifice, will never be forgotten."
But she WAS...Babs thought sadly. She saved the universe...and Superman. But she couldn't save herself...
And nobody remembered.
If it hadn't been for those creepy e-mails from Holy Martyrs parish and Father Stephen Patrick, she wouldn't have remembered Kara either.
The former Batgirl stared at the screen for a long time...Sadness and joy jockeying for position. Joy eventually won out.
Just like Clark, Kara beat the Reaper, she thought. I don't know how, but she did it.
She chuckled. Must be a family thing.
Then put her systems to sleep and went to bed.
(See TesubCalle's story: 'Apokalypsis: An Unremembered Death' on for the whole story.)