Chapter 17 – Aftermath

When they were finally home, Conner was waiting for them in the living room, the giant wolf that was his pet by his side.

"Claire!" He went to hug her, just as fiercely as her father had moments ago. When he let her go, he smiled. "Liked the outfit."

She laughed. "Well, my uniform is not ready yet, so I decided to borrow your idea for one."

"You're making a uniform?" her dad asked, already in civil clothes, closing the curtains of the veranda.

"Of course! Kelex is helping me out." She said.

Clark shook his head in amusement.

"Sorry for not telling anything to you," Conner started. "it became a real mess with Captain Marvel and everything… I kind of forgot."

"It's okay." She replied. "I think it was better for me staying here. I helped quite a lot here, too."

"That you did." Their father kissed her temple again. "And I'm just glad it's over. You have no idea how worried I was with you two."

He hugged them both, closely, and they basked in the moment, all three of them together, like a family.

And then the phone started to ring. Clark gave them one more kiss to the temple each, and went to pick it.

"Hello?"

"Clark? Honey, is everything alright?" Said Martha Kent, and Clark could just see the frown of worry on his face.

"Hey Ma. Everything's okay now, don't worry. We're all home."

"Thank God. What happened?"

Clark started to explain the magic and what happened after – even telling Ma how Bruce was absolutely crazy with worry for Dick, which was always cute to watch – all the while he watched his sons talking quietly to each other.

Wolf was by Conner's side, already done with smelling Claire. He couldn't say no when Conner asked if he could bring him to the apartment that night – only that night. Claire petted Wolf's fur, and the spark in her eyes could not be denied.

Eventually, he said goodbye to his mother – after letting her talk on speaker to her grandchildren – and sent his twins to change while he occupied himself in cooking, trying to gain some normalcy to the end of his day.

He had to.

He knew, deep in his bones, that Claire's debut as Supergirl would make his life a lot more difficult starting the next day, so he needed the hours of normalcy he had.

~.~

He was right, of course. All the way to the Daily Planet, the only thing he heard people whispering was Superman's apparent daughter, who had appeared in Metropolis during the crisis of the week. He was already nursing a small headache only in thinking what would be inside the newsroom, and that was without thinking of the League, who would probably have a meeting soon – Batman was clear to them yesterday, they had a lot to discuss.

As soon as he entered the newsroom, he thought he was in hell. Perry was barking orders all over the place, people running from left to right to catch up all the details they could about what happened. They hadn't seen Supergirl in action, being in the 'adult world'; but there were enough blurry and almost distinct photos of her in the web, posted by the lucky teens with smartphones and time to register.

He was kind of proud of Claire for not giving them enough time for good pictures, really.

He got to his desk right on time to hear Lois whine.

"I just can't believe he wouldn't tell me that! It must be a mistake!"

He looked at his side to see Lois on her desk, looking through all the photos of Supergirl from yesterday, looking crestfallen and like she didn't had any minute of sleep.

She was whining to no one in particular, so Clark decided to let himself be known.

"Hey Lo. What's wrong?"

That was the obviously wrong thing to say, because Lois looked at him even more crestfallen, looking like she was about to cry.

"What do you mean? Everything's wrong! Superman has a daughter and he didn't tell me!"

Clark fought the urge to roll his eyes. It wasn't polite.

"Hey, I'm sure he has his reasons. And… is it really his daughter?"

"Afraid so. There's a picture of them at a school sports court, hugging, and he looked pretty relieved to see her. Here."

She turned the computer monitor to him, and he saw she was right. He hadn't thought at the moment that someone could take pictures of them like that, and honestly, he didn't care. All he cared that time was that his daughter – his world, his everything – was safe. And the photo showed that, every ounce of relief that he felt when he hugged her. It was actually a very good picture. He would have to frame it somewhere.

"Well…" he cleared his throat. "It looks like father and daughter to me."

Lois sighed, clearly defeated, by what Clark had yet to know.

"Yeah. It looks like it. How about yours?"

"They're fine, thank God. I was about to go mad yesterday, when everything came back to normal."

At least he wasn't lying about that.

"I keep forgetting you have twins now. Like, I was used to hearing about Claire, and now you have a boy her age, too."

"Yeah…" he cleared his throat again. "It's weird for me too, but I'm getting used to it."

"Is he doing okay too? Conner?"

He thought about how his son had helped defeat Klarion and his partners and smiled.

"He's doing great."

With that, she smiled and returned to her computer.

Of course, that wasn't the end of it. Lois went to interview a few people about the incident, and Clark eventually had to leave as Superman to save someone. The moment Superman showed his colors, people started to ask him questions. Questions he didn't answer, not yet. He knew someone who would love an exclusive, and his daughter deserved to be properly introduced to the world.

~.~

Superman wasn't the only one receiving questions about Claire. School had declared a day off so the children could stay home with their parents, so Conner was in the Cave with Wolf… being interrogated by his teammates, with the exception of Robin, who was in Gotham.

"I mean, I had no idea!" Wally was saying. "But then I got home and there were pictures all over the web about her! Is she really Superman's daughter?"

Well, Conner was lucky they had talked about that the day before, or he would've run in fear for his life if he didn't answer their questions.

"Yeah, she is." He said, petting Wolf by his side. "She's really cool."

"What's her name?" M'gann asked, her eyes sparkling with curiosity.

"Huh, her kryptonian name is Kara. I'm not sure if I can tell you guys her human name, sorry."

"That's okay. Wow, a daughter! How did Superman hide this all this time?!" said Artemis.

"I'm actually curious," said Zatanna, talking for the first time since he arrived, her eyes still sad for her dad. "why he didn't tell anyone in the League about her."

"I think Batman and Wonder Woman know." Conner shrugged. "He's overprotective about her. She didn't want to be a superhero until a few months ago, so that helped."

"And now? Does she want?" asked M'gann.

"Yeah. And I think she'll be wonderful."

"Maybe she could come to the Team!" said M'gann, excited about the idea.

"Maybe." He agreed.

"You could bring her here, you know." Said Wally, his eyes full of mirth. "Introduce her to us."

"Stop being a jerk, Wally." Said Artemis. "You only want to flirt with her."

Conner laughed.

"I think Superman's going to bring her soon, Wally." He said, because they did talk about that the day before, too.

"Well, I bet she's hot." He said.

"Yep, she's gorgeous." Said Robin, out of nowhere, scaring the hell out of everyone in the room.

"DUDE!" Wally shouted. "STOP THAT!"

"What?" he replied, innocent. "You guys didn't hear the zetas?"

"No… You sneaky bastard." Said Artemis.

Robin shrugged. "Not my fault."

"Okay, okay… You were saying Supergirl was hot." Of course Wally wouldn't forget the subject.

"I said she's gorgeous." He corrected.

"Same thing, really, but… How do you know?"

"Because I know her. We used to train together right when I started. Bats thought it would be a nice thing for me to train with her, since she was super strong, but not Superman-strong yet. She's great."

And just like that, the interrogation went from Conner to Robin, who smirked and gave them all half-truths e gloated about how he was friends with Kara. Conner only laughed.

~.~

Kyle and Lena were in love with Supergirl. Claire couldn't stop giggling about that.

"I mean, Supergirl! She's my new favorite hero!" Lena was saying, while the three of them walked around the mall, since they didn't have any classes that day.

"You don't even know if she's nice." Claire said.

"She's Superman's daughter, Claire," Kyle replied. "She's definitely nice."

She just rolled her eyes and let them talk, hearing their awe for her, making her feel really light and happy.

At least people were reacting positively to her. She was kind of relieved, actually. The only downside was lying to her best friends. She hoped that, one day, she could tell them the truth about herself. But she knew it didn't depend on her alone. She had a secret that involved her whole family, and she had to be careful about everything she did or say now, twice as much careful.

The aftermath of her appearing out of nowhere to help was good so far for most people, but she had a lot to do yet. And, she knew, the path to becoming Supergirl for real wasn't going to be easy.

But now, she was finally ready.

I know, I'm surprised I'm posting another one so soon, but hey... Miracles happen! xD

Thank you for all your support so far. I'm hoping to finish this story until the end of next month, let's see!

As usual, tell me what you think! xo