"But she's going to recognize you the second she sees you…?" Winn frowned. "How are you going to avoid her the entire evening?"

Alex looked up, in full tactical seriousness. "We're going to recon the building, locate her, and get her before the auction even starts. There are a lot of witnesses, people that would certainly be missed if they turned into collateral damage. There will probably be guards, or at least some type of peacekeeping, so we're going to have to go stealthy."

She sighed, tapping her earpiece. "Kara? How are you doing?"

"I'm seeing a main entrance, two emergency exits on opposite sides of the building, and a stage door in the back."

Maggie moved forward to draw circles around the doors on the blueprints in front of them. "If we block the stage door with a DEO van, and get eyes on the emergency exits, we're covered."

"Alex?"

"Yeah, I'm here."

"… There might be other exits. I can see another floor underneath the theatre. It's probably a basement."

"Okay, we'll keep that in mind." Alex looked up at Maggie. "I am a bio-engineer that made millions off a patent for nanobots that stimulate brain activity in comatose patients."

Maggie raised an eyebrow. "You had all of that ready?"

Alex smiled, and tilted her head. "Well, I'll admit, the results have been optimistic, but we're not quite ready to market. The past weeks have kind of slowed down the timeline."

The detective shook her head, and gazed up at Alex in adoration. She made a mental note to ask Alex more about the miracles she was working every day in that lab of hers, but then realized that now the eyes were on her.

"Right, uh… Well…" She went over her past undercover aliases. "…I'm a PI."

"I like that." Alex nodded. "Names are okay – the DEO hasn't run into problems with any of those artist aliens yet, except for the two we have now. No cameras, just microphones in the dresses and an earpiece. Do you have a tracker?"

Maggie shook her head.

"Okay, we're going to insert one, just to be sure. But stay close to me. And keep talking."

In all honesty – she wouldn't dream of leaving Alex alone in there. But she understood where Alex came from. Her tracker had saved the agent's life in the water tank when she'd been abducted.

"I'll put one in your shoes too, just to be sure." Winn added from his desk. Alex seemed satisfied. "You ever been undercover before?"

Maggie chuckled. "More than you, Danvers, I bet. I worked vice for a few months back in Gotham."

Alex seemed equally impressed, but didn't voice it. Instead, she checked her watch. "If we start recon at eleven, that means seven more hours. Let's get that tracker inserted."

Winn winced at the thought, and it didn't go unnoticed. But Maggie had other things on her mind.

"Alright, so I'm going to make a small incision, about two inches long. I need to insert the tracker a few inches deep, and I might not get it on the first try…"

"Just do it, Alex. It's fine." Maggie smiled weakly. She didn't need the cautiousness her girlfriend was employing. She'd been cut wide open before on different occasions – it was the last thing she was worried about.

Alex applied a local anesthetic, and touched around her thigh until Maggie signaled that it had become numb. She cleared her throat to break the silence between them. "So, uh… Vice?"

Maggie chuckled. "It was a long time ago."

"Couldn't have been more than a few years."

"Well, a lot has happened since then. And I was moved to National City a few months after I started."

"Why? Moving along with a job?" Alex guessed. If people were smart enough to move their business to another city, it made sense for her to travel along.

She didn't expect Maggie's honest answer.

"… I got pulled out of an active undercover op, actually. Had to relocate to the other side of the country immediately to avoid them catching on to our operation."

"Oh." Alex frowned, as she started making the incision. "Well… Y-you're okay, now, right?"

Maggie sighed as she watched Alex cut through her skin. "They never caught up to me. They assume that I got killed somewhere by police. In any case, they were human. It was just a stupid drug trafficking gang. Nothing remotely close to the things we handle now."

As Alex reached for the tracker on the tray next to her, a realization dawned on her. "Is that why you don't like therapy?"

She felt Maggie stiffen underneath her, and realized that she'd made a mistake in handling it so bluntly. "I-I mean…"

"N-no. I… I owe you the truth anyway. Just in case tonight goes bad." Maggie chuckled nervously, but Alex didn't join in. Instead, the detective heaved a deep breath. "I uh… I got pulled out of the op because the gang's leader had discovered that we were running surveillance, and he managed to abduct one of the analysts working alongside me. At that point, they didn't know anything about me or who I was, so I was safe. But they… Alex, they beat the shit out of him. Tortured him, made him beg for them to kill him. And…" She looked away. Alex had put the tracker in, but had stopped reaching for her suture kit. Instead, she watched as the detective tried to keep the tears at bay.

"Maggie…"

But the other woman shook her head and continued. "…They expected me to… participate. Because I was supposed to hate cops… And so, I did." She pressed her lips together. "… I beat him. Kicked him, punched him. Hit him with brass knuckles, I'm pretty sure I actually cracked his skull at some point."

Alex was stunned into silence.

Maggie sighed. "After they presented the body on a silver platter to the police, my handler pulled me out immediately. They faked me dying at the hands of the police, and relocated me to National City."

"That's… horrible." Was all Alex could say. Her stomach had dropped, and she felt ready to throw up at the raw pain and regret in Maggie's eyes.

"They tried to put me in therapy. But all it did was make me angry. I wanted to kill him for acting like he understood what I did. It wasn't me. It was the person I was pretending to be. It was kill or be killed. And he kept on telling me that my feelings were 'valid' and that I 'deserved' my own forgiveness, no, fuck that." She reached sideways and threw the tray that the tracker had been resting on against the wall of the med bay.

Alex winced at the clattering of the tray, and took a step back, waiting for Maggie to finish raging. She knew that what she needed was space to tell the story. So she was going to give it to her.

"I don't deserve forgiveness. I have to live with what I did." Maggie whispered, staring at the upside down tray on the ground. "And that alien, that bitch that killed an entire family and murders innocent people? She's going to have to live with it too. And if she doesn't – I'll put a bullet in her skull."

When all that was left was Maggie's heavy breathing from the outburst, Alex kissed her temple, and sutured the wound on her thigh, before covering it with a bandage.

A few hours later, the both of them stood in the command center for a final briefing. Maggie was wearing an elegant black dress with red lipstick, completing the look of a charming PI. Alex had a pantsuit on that covered the prosthetic well in case anything happened to it.

J'onn, Winn and Kara stood around the table, as well as a few other operatives that would assist.

"We don't have eyes on the inside. So we're relying on the both of you to relay everything through the audio feed. We're recording everything for evidence, so we'll be listening in, but I want a verbal check-in every five to ten minutes." J'onn had his arms crossed behind his back. "We have one agent watching each emergency exit with a sniper rifle, but we need confirmation before taking the shot."

Alex took over effortlessly. "Once inside, we'll recon. See where the artists are, see who the attendees are. Once we can locate the Ragh'tah, we'll lure it into the backstage to overpower it."

"How?" Kara frowned.

"We have a few ideas." Alex replied. "But it'll all depend on the situation. As far as the rest goes – you stay in the vicinity of the building and listen in. Don't come in until something goes absolutely wrong. We want to keep this as quiet as possible, so we don't spook the clients."

Her watch beeped. She looked up. "It's ten. We should head out."

The other agents walked out, followed by J'onn. Winn grabbed his tablet and earpiece, and ran after them. Kara stayed behind, frowning at the pair. "I… I really don't like this."

"Undercover ops are meant to be quiet, Kara." Maggie sighed.

The irony of the statement didn't go lost on Alex.

"You're supposed to get information. If the DEO comes in, guns blazing, then the entirety of National City's finest rich people lose their prime entertainment, and bragging rights."

"I could go undercover… People don't know my secret identity…" Kara pleaded, but neither of the women was having it. Kara sighed, but finally gave in. "Fine. But I can be there in less than five seconds if anything goes wrong. And I won't hesitate."

As dramatic as that would be for the mission, Alex still smiled at the sentiment.

Maggie, on the other hand, stayed awfully quiet.

The invitation tucked nicely in her clutch, Alex had to fight off the insecurities that were creeping into her mind. Before they went in, she had to be sure that Maggie was one hundred percent alright.

So, a few buildings before the theatre, she raised a hand to slow Maggie down, and looked her in the eyes. "Are you going to be okay?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" Maggie frowned, already moving again. But Alex reached for her hand and held it in hers. "I love you, Mags. And I'm… You didn't have to tell me about what happened. But you did. And I just need to know that you're okay."

"This is nothing like that op. I'm fine."

Alex hesitated. She could see the wheels turning behind Maggie's eyes – knew that her girlfriend's mind was conjuring up scenarios where she'd be forced to hurt Alex against her will in order to maintain her cover. But none of that would happen.

Maggie seemed to understand what Alex was trying to imply. It didn't help her nerves, but it did make her squeeze her hand. "I'm good, Alex. Let's finish this. Together."

Alex smiled, raising her hand to put it on Maggie's cheek, and leaning in to kiss her gently. "Whatever happens, okay?"

Maggie nodded. "Whatever happens."

After that, Alex linked their hands back together, and they walked to the entrance of the theater.

Alex handed a man dressed in a tuxedo the invitation from her clutch, as the man read through it and held it up against the light. "Name?"

"Alexandra and Margaret Danvers."

Maggie felt a twinge in her chest at hearing the name.

The man wrote something down on a list lying on a nearby podium, and nodded. "Enjoy your evening, Mrs. and Mrs. Danvers."

Maggie felt the hand around her arm tighten as they walked into the foyer.

This was it.