The information crystals turned out to be the most boring things on the planet. They had started out as a group, all huddled around in a circle to hear what is on each one. They all started out hungry for information, but it turns out that a lot of it is much more boring than they originally thought it would be.
The group gradually dwindled down to just Kara, Lena and little Esme.
Esme clings to every last word that comes out of Kara's mouth, her brain vying for as much knowledge as it can get. Lena is in the same boat, Esme perched on her lap with her godmother's arms around her waist, she silently takes in every bit of information She can.
Kara is lounging back in her chair. By this point, the translating has become fairly easy and she is able to make quick notes on anything she finds useful. To be completely honest, there isn't a whole lot of information that will be helpful to the mission, but they have time to kill, she finds it interesting anyway and two of her favourite people are enjoying listening to her talk so they must find it interesting too.
They spend hours that way, Lena and Esme snuggled in one chair and Kara in another, notebook firmly in hand. She only stops when they run out of crystals and by that time her hand is aching, and Esme is still clambering for more, so she promises to tell her more stories and information about Krypton in the future with a kiss to her forehead.
When they pass the little gem back to her parents she is already half asleep, proving to them that she had kept herself awake just to hear her aunt bless her with knowledge. It reminds Kara of her aunt once more.
It surprises her how much she thinks of her. She had expected that she would be on edge being on the same planet as her parents but somehow, being here with her aunt haunts her much more, and forces her to remember the good times that all lead back to the memory of her death.
She worries about it a lot more than she will admit, how it is all affecting her emotionally. The last thing she wants is for the team to treat her with fragility like she will shatter at any moment. She won't let herself become a liability.
The only one who seems to notice anything is amiss is Lena, around the others she can pretend, she can smile and laugh and nod her head, but around Lena, it's harder. She spends the majority of her day with her, and at night when it's dark and everyone else is asleep, it feels like Lena can sense whenever she is in her head because she shuffles across the bed and holds her, keeping her pieces pressed together like she's the glue keeping her whole.
The odd thing is that they never speak of it. Maybe it is out of pity or compassion. She doesn't know, but she is grateful.
The clock is ticking though, she will have to address it sooner or later, it would be unfair of her to burden Lena with it without at least giving her answers, explaining why she is forced to hold together the woman who is supposed to be strong.
She forgets all of her worries when Lena looks over to her with a lopsided grin and beckons her to the kitchen. Her feet take her there before her mind can catch up with what she is doing.
"Hey."
"Hey."
Lena leans back against the counter. "I thought we could sort through the food here and decide what we are going to take with us and see how much we can reasonably carry."
With a nod, Kara gets to work. She places a few things aside to get them through the rest of their stay but is already weighing up her options for what is best to take. There are several things that would have been perfect if they were lighter, like the grain which would be great for keeping them full for a long time and providing them with lots of nutrients.
"How much extra weight would you say each of us could carry?" Kara wonders, her eyebrows pinched in thought.
Lena's expression matches her own as she tries to weigh it up herself. "Not as much as I would like."
Kara's expression clears. "And what if we didn't have to carry it?"
Lena squints at her, a smile already forming on her face. "Kara Zor-El Danvers, what have you got in mind?"
"How easy would you say it would be to build a device that could transport the food using the same machinery that a Kelex is built from?"
The gleam in Lena's eyes is a sight to see. Kara can see the blueprints mapping themselves out in her irises.
Lena clears her throat. "We might be up all night or have to delay our exit by a couple of hours if necessary, but I would say that it is worth it and completely doable."
They share a smile and set to work on weighing the food that they would realistically need to take with them. Once they have their baseline for a minimum weight to aim for, they march their way out of the kitchen to give Alex a brief rundown of what they are planning on doing.
With a kiss to Kelly's lips and a tender stroke to her sleeping daughter's hair, Alex is following them back down to the lab for the second time in as many days. "I'm stoked to be able to play with this tech."
"This is important, Alex," Kara says, the stern tone bringing out her sister's belligerent side.
In a nasal voice, Alex mimics her sister. "This is important, Alex."
Lena stops Kara from responding by stepping in front of her and raising her hands up in a stop motion when they both stick their tongues out at each other like they are still kids fighting over a toy.
Luckily for Lena, the sisters break out into smiles and begin working like none of the squabbling ever happened. They had found a cupboard full of Kelex parts yesterday but hadn't really thought much about it other than assuming that The Rebellion had dismantled them so no information could be passed through them about their plans.
They gather some of the parts and spread them across the table. They need to put their heads together in order to get this to work.
"Alright, the easiest thing to do would be a cart with wheels but we could do that without using Kelex parts and would be no good for when we get to rougher terrain," Alex speaks her mind as the thoughts flow through her head.
"But we all know from the Kelex that we have seen that they fly so it we can pinpoint those parts-" Lena follows on from Alex's train of thought.
"-Then we don't have to worry about the terrain, and we won't be located because the technology from Kelex wouldn't be tracked as malicious technology by the council so all in all, they won't notice a thing. Perfect." Kara finishes.
Within the hour, they have gone through half a dozen designs before settling on one, the simplest. A standard hollowed-out Kelex with the boosters still intact so it can still fly. Depending on how long it takes to build, they may even get the opportunity to build a second, but they'll have to see how that goes.
While the space inside of the Kelex is small, it is more than enough to carry the heaviest items and they have decided to leave the arms attached so they can make it carry a backpack.
Kara can't help but be a little bit disturbed by the idea of a headless, hollow Kelex flying about and it shows very plainly on her face, so Alex and Lena dismiss her, sending her off to 'rest'.
She wanders back upstairs to find Nia and Kelly, the two sanest members of their group. They are all lying on the floor and staring up. They have found a pocket projector that displays educational images.
On Krypton, education is personalised for each person, so the pocket projector is a little sphere with rigid bands entwined around the outside that displays different educational projections to help students that are visual learners. Kara had one herself when she was a child.
They were found to be so useful that almost everyone has one, adult or child. Right now, Nia, Kelly and Esme are all staring up at a projection of the solar system, so unfamiliar compared their own.
She watches from a distance, taking serenity in the people she loves, her found family, looking at her home, something that is part of her, with so much admiration and fascination.
Kelly notices her lingering there a little while later and summons her over. "Are you joining us or are you going to stand there all day?"
With a gentle smile, Kara lowers herself down next to Nia, waving to Esme as she does. The excited wave back warms her heart before she lets herself relax and enjoy the view, a cushion shoved under her head.
The swirling planets rotating around Rao brings tears to her eyes, it's been a long time since she has seen this particular projection. Astra used to show it to her before she would take her outside and teach her the constellations, teach her how to get home if she were to ever find herself lost. Look at her now, back where she started.
They sit in silence, all of them entranced in their own ways. The gentle movements above their heads are a wonderful relaxation tool, perhaps too relaxing.
Kara doesn't know when she fell asleep, but she does grumble when she is shaken gently, and a soft voice is talking in her ear. Very reluctantly, she does open her eyes.
"Hey sleepyhead, let's get you off this floor, huh?"
With her hair framing her face and the light hitting her eyes perfectly, making the colours swim across her irises like a ripple across a gentle pond, Lena looks like an angel.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to fall asleep." Kara brings a hand up to rub her eyes, trying to force away some of the fatigue. "I guess I was a little bit more tired than I thought."
"Don't worry, you weren't the only one." Lena smiles down at her.
Kara is now gaining back her senses a bit as she is welcomed back to the world of the waking. She is now feeling the warm pressure of a little body pressed to her side and a little head using her as a pillow.
Lena is crouched next to them, a fond amusement in her smile. "I almost don't want to move her, but your back will thank me tomorrow when you have slept in a bed instead of on the floor."
"I'm good now, I don't need to go to bed. What time is it anyway?"
"It's mid-afternoon, we still have a few hours left to go before dinner and Alex and I are getting on great working on our project. You should go get a couple more hours of beauty sleep while you can. You have had a lot of pent-up stress and anxiety so please go and try to relax, for me?"
Lena always complains about how Kara's pout is deadly but clearly, she has never seen her own puppy dog eyes in the mirror because Kara is now finding herself completely unable to put up any kind of resistance.
With a small nod of confirmation, Lena very carefully eases Esme off the floor and into her arms, carrying her through to her room and tucking her into bed next to where her teddy is already waiting for her.
She sighs when she sees that kara has only made it as far as to sit up in all of the time she's been gone but leaves it for a minute to let Kelly know where Esme is now so she can keep an eye on her.
She doesn't say another word to Kara, she just struts right up behind her and with an arm under each armpit, she heaves her up onto her feet and then guides her all the way through the accommodation to the bedroom.
Every time Kara so much as thinks about resisting and offering to help with the Kelex, Lena seems to sense it, so she is sent another pleading look, coercing her to give in and have a nap.
"I want you to actually try to relax," Lena instructs.
"Yes, boss."
"That's what I like to hear." Lena sends her a sly grin as Kara clambers into bed and manoeuvres herself into a comfy position. "Have a good nap, darling."
Kara waves in response, peeking around the duvet to watch her as she closes the door ad leaves her with her thoughts. There's no way that she is going to be able to sleep now, her brain is too busy, but her eyelids do feel a little bit droopy.
It takes less than two minutes for Kara to fall asleep.
She is awoken by the sound of muffled shuffling around her. It takes a little while for her to be able to open her eyes enough to see through the dim light so she can make out what is going on. There is a dark silhouette systematically moving around the room.
"Hi."
Lena turns towards her with a smile. "Hey, I hope I didn't wake you."
"No, me? I've been awake for ages." Kara tries to act as flippant as possible, but her sluggish movements give her away.
Lena puts her hands on her hips, "is that right? I could have sworn I heard a little bit of snoring coming from the bed not too long ago, is all."
"Must have been someone else, what are you doing anyway?" Kara asks.
To answer her question, Lena holds up a pile of folded clothes. "Kelly did laundry earlier, so we are getting started on packing. I've finished yours for you, so you don't need to worry about that."
"Remind me to thank momma bear later please?"
"With a chuckle, Lena agrees. "Sure."
Kara finally drags herself out of bed and stands beside Lena to help her pack her things. "How is the Kelex coming along?"
"We finished it, you just need to tell us what is best to store in it. We thought about building a second one but then we wouldn't have enough spare parts to fix the first one if anything goes wrong."
Kara thinks for a minute before ultimately agreeing with their decision. "Good choice, we don't want to be stripping a Kelex for parts in the middle of nowhere and have to dump out a bunch of stuff we can't carry anymore."
They continue to work side by side, Kara folding clothes and passing them to Lena to put in her bag. Once the bags are packed they tidy up the room the best they can, not caring if things aren't perfect since they aren't leaving until tomorrow morning anyway.
Since she is wide awake, Kara treats them to another meal, Esme working as her little helper and Kelly watching too, partly to keep an eye on her daughter, partly to learn how to make the meal but mostly to spend a bit of time with Kara. They don't often get as much bonding time as the others.
They had offered Nia to help too but she and Lena had found a board game and were battling it out whilst Alex cheers them on, pitting them against one another and placing bets.
"How have you been feeling?" Kelly jumps right into it when Esme is distracted, kneading dough out to make a bread.
Kara matches Kelly's low tone of voice, trying to keep the conversation private from prying ears. "Sometimes good and sometimes bad. Lena helps a lot."
"I can see that, I didn't realise quite how close you guys are, you practically read each other's minds," Kelly observes.
Kara nods, her relationship with Lena is a complicated one. "Yeah, we've been through a lot together and we are alike in a lot more ways than you'd think, plus she is the kindest, most thoughtful person I've ever known, so that helps too."
Kelly doesn't look completely satisfied with the response and the indecision is clear when she pauses for a beat too long before speaking again. "Is that all? I've seen you look at each other in a way that speaks of more than just friendship."
Kara wasn't expecting her to be so blunt. "My relationship with Lena is just a friendship, even if one of us wanted more, it would still be a friendship because I can't force her to feel more than that for me."
"So, you do want more than a friendship?"
Kara breathes deeply through her nose. "Sometimes we want things we can't have."
Kelly wants to argue, to tell her that it is clear that Lena feels the same way about her too, but Kara has already turned her back and is helping Esme roll out the dough, laughing with her as they get flour all over their hands.
That's a conversation for another time, one for after she has determined how Lena feels too. Another heart-to-heart is in order.
She peeks over at the others and finds Lena looking back into the kitchen, but she's not looking at her.
She's checking on Kara, a fond smile covering her face as she watches Kara tickle the little one until she's erupting in giggles and squeals.
Yep, they've got it bad for one another.
Kelly isn't one for forcing people to do things they don't want to do or trickling people into doing the things she wants them to, but it would be a crime to not help them figure out their potential as a couple.