Alex was fighting alongside Supergirl and Mon-El against Cyborg Superman and a few Cadmus agents on the roof of a building.
Kara was mostly beating Cyborg Superman single-handedly; Mon-El had his own three Cadmus Agents to fight; and Alex was going against Lillian Luther herself, who had just shown up.
She was beating her, throwing one last punch to get her to the ground.
"Give up! You can't beat us!" she told her angrily.
But Lillian was laughing sickly. "You really do believe that, don't you?" Then she threw a punch back, making Alex fall off the edge of the two-storey building.
"Pathetic." Lillian said, then took off with the rest of her team.
Luckily, Alex managed to hold on to the edge, but she was slipping off more and more with each second.
She wanted to call out for Kara, but then she got a thought. 'It wasn't that high. The fall wouldn't kill her. It would cause a few broken bones, but she'd survive. And they were in Washington, very near Seattle. Was that the chance she had been waiting for?'
She weighed her options nervously. She didn't have much time to think it over anyway.
Suddenly, she heard Kara calling for her, knowing she'd save her any second now.
So she let go.
It was a normal day in the E.R. at Seattle Grace Mercy West Hospital. Jo Wilson had just finished stitching up a little kid who ran into a doorknob.
"There you go." she smiled.
"Thank you, Dr. Wilson." the little girl smiled back and went to her father's side.
Suddenly, she heard someone calling for help. It was coming from outside, so she went to look.
There was a woman in a skirt and red boots with long blonde hair. She was holding another woman, a brunette, who looked badly bruised.
"Are you a doctor?" the blonde asked as soon as she saw her.
"Yes, I am Dr. Wilson. What happened?"
"My sister fell off a building and is unconscious. Please help me." she cried.
"Okay, okay, it's okay. Don't worry, we're going to help her." Jo calmed her down, then shouted for a stretcher.
They brought her inside, and Jo gave her a brief exam to exclude any injuries that would require immediate medical attention.
Then she paged Dr. Torres, suspecting a few broken bones.
Kara was holding her unconscious sister's hand the whole time. She felt guilty for not being able to save her or catch her before she hit the ground.
A few minutes later, Callie came, but she froze as soon as she saw the girl on the stretcher.
"Alright, Dr. Wilson, what do we-"
"Dr. Torres? Is something wrong? Are you okay?" she wondered.
"I-I- No... this isn't possible... she's dead..." she mumbled, her brain trying hard to figure out how this could be true.
She spotted the blonde sitting beside the girl on the stretcher and decided to ask her. "Excuse me, what's her name? And who are you?"
"Her name is Alexandra Danvers, and I'm her sister. Please, you need to fix her." she replied, tears in her eyes.
"Are you sure?" Callie blurted out.
Jo's eyes widened in confusion. She cleared her throat extra loudly. "Dr. Torres?"
But she simply ignored her.
"What?" Kara asked. 'Why was the doctor who was supposed to save her sister's life acting so strangely?'
"Can you just help her?" she added, getting impatient.
Callie snapped out of it. She needed to be sure. 'But how could that not be Lexie Grey? She looked exactly like her. But she died, didn't she? Everyone said so.'
"Yeah, of course, I'm so sorry. I just thought she looked familiar, but I was wrong." She lied and started to examine her leg first.
"Uh, Wilson, schedule an x-ray. We gotta take a close look at that leg." she ordered, and then continued to examine the rest of her body.
The X-ray didn't take long, and when they got the results, Callie was sure about her hunch.
Jo took a look at the images and had a confused look on her face again. "No way she broke like all her bones, right?"
"No, she didn't. Those are old breaks. They aren't fully healed yet. They're about two and a half years old." the Latina explained.
"Oh, right, I see that. That fracture looks darker. That's the one from the fall now. But still, it looks like half her body, both her legs, her pelvis, and her left arm were crushed by something heavy. How did she even survive that?" Jo wondered. She wasn't sure if she felt sorry for the girl or if she was fascinated by her injuries—probably both.
"That's what I'm trying to figure out." Callie muttered.
"You know what? I got it from here. I don't need your help anymore. But page Dr. Grey and Dr. Sloan for me, will you?" she requested.
"Okay..." Jo didn't understand why the girl needed a plastic surgeon, but she decided not to question her attending's behaviour today.
She did as she was told, then went to talk to the sister.
Meanwhile, Callie admitted the still-unconscious woman to a room. She would need surgery, but not just yet. First, she needed to give her some answers.
After she put her in a room, she went outside the door, where both Meredith and Mark rushed in her direction.
"What's up?" the blonde asked, out of breath. "You paged an emergency?" Mark added.
Callie didn't even know how to start. "I-uh..."
"Spit it out, Torres." Her best friend pushed impatiently.
"Okay, I'm aware that what I'm going to tell you is going to sound completely insane and won't make any sense, but..." she struggled.
Mark shot her a look.
"A girl that was just admitted looks exactly like..."
"Lexie?" Meredith finished after peeking through the window of the room behind her.
Mark burst through the door, almost shoving his best friend out of the way.
He saw her face, and it was like his heart stopped. 'That couldn't be true, right? Was he dreaming again? If he went up to her now, would he just wake up in his bed the next second, without her lying next to him again? Would she just disappear again?'
Meredith was just as shocked. "How is that...?"
"I don't know. I really don't." Callie told her, then grabbed the X-ray scans from the table and held them up. "But look at her x-rays. They look exactly like half her body had been crushed by a plane about two and a half years ago. I mean, we could do a blood test, but I'm pretty sure it's Lexie."
"No, it is. It is Lexie." Meredith told her. She was sure it was her.
Callie noticed that her best friend was still standing in the same spot, staring at Lexie. "Mark? Are you okay?"
"I can't do this anymore." he said sadly.
"What?" both women were confused.
"This is just another dream. I'm gonna wake up if I touch her. That's how it always is, but I can't keep losing her anymore. If I just stare at her, I can keep her." he explained desperately. He didn't even tell Torres about his nightmares. He didn't tell anyone. After he lost Lexie, he shut off all of his friends and family. He wished every day that he had died in the woods from that tamponade. He would be with her now, not forced to live without her, because he couldn't imagine building a family or anything with anyone else but her.
"Mark, this is real." Meredith told him. "Lexie's alive." She smiled at her sister as she took her hand. "I don't know how or why, but she's here."
"I can't lose her again." Mark argued, tears forming in his eyes.
So Callie took his arm and slowly led him to the bed. Then she carefully led his hand to touch hers.
The moment he felt his skin make contact with hers, he expected to wake up. He always woke up in this exact moment, just before he was able to feel her, but he didn't.
He cracked a smile. He couldn't believe it—she was actually alive.
"She's alive." he said happily, like all the life just got sucked back into him, and his eyes lit up with joy instead of having that dead look in them.
He immediately took her hand and sat down on her other side.
Callie smiled before deciding to leave the three alone. On her way out the door, she ran into the blonde girl from before.
"Hey! You're Dr. Torres, right? How is my sister Alex? Can I see her?" she asked.
"She's gonna be just fine. But she'll go into surgery soon. She needs to be prepped, so you can't see her now. I'm sorry." She lied and quickly went the other way.
Kara was disappointed and sat back down in the waiting room. 'At least Alex will be okay.'
Mark and Meredith sat beside Lexie, waiting for her to wake up.
Suddenly, the blonde got a page. She looked at her pager. "It's Derek."
"It's fine. I'm gonna stay. I'll page you when she wakes up." Mark assured her. He wouldn't leave this room, no matter what.
Meredith was hesitant, but it was apparently urgent, so she agreed. "Page me immediately!" she stressed, then rushed to wherever her husband was.
A few minutes later, Mark was still holding Lexie's hand—the last time he did that, he felt the warmth slowly leaving it—and almost fell asleep. His neck laid uncomfortably against the back of the chair.
But then he felt her fingers move just a little, and his eyes shot open. He was immediately wide awake.
Lexie slowly opened her eyes and struggled to adjust to the bright light from the lamp right above her.
She looked around and realized where she was. Her plan had actually worked.
Then she felt something holding her hand, something warm. She looked to her side and saw Mark's face, smiling big.
"Hey." he whispered happily.
"Hey." She smiled back.
Meanwhile, Meredith had to take on a new patient, as she was on Derek's service today. She excused herself and hurried back to her sister's room.
Lexie and Mark were just intensely staring at each other when she opened the door.
"Lexie." she said happily.
"Meredith." The brunette greeted her with the same energy.
She went to hug her as best she could, lying down like she did.
Then the blonde sat back down on the chair she had before.
"I can't believe this. You're alive." she told her in joy.
"H-How?" Mark cut in, his voice breaking.
It was obvious that he was hurt, but he tried to cover it up.
"It's a very long story." Lexie started, taking a deep breath. "Our plane didn't go down by accident. We flew over a training area for a secret government organisation, and something hit the engine. When the helicopter came to your rescue, it was them. They were covering up their mistake. That's why they took me separately. They thought I was dead. God, I thought I was dead. I don't know how exactly, but they fixed me. A few months later, I woke up, and I was almost fine. I was still a little sore, but my body was repaired. They kept me at their base because they needed a doctor for a research project. But an agent said he saw potential in me, and he trained me to become an agent too. Then I got assigned to an undercover case, and everything just got even more complicated. They strictly forbid me to reach out to any of you. They were scared to get caught for bringing the plane down, so they made me adapt a new identity." she explained. She hoped she had covered everything important. After all, it was a lot.
The two were looking at her, processing what they had just heard. It was absurd, but they couldn't come up with a more reasonable explanation.
"You were dead. You had no pulse. I held your hand for hours, your cold hand." Mark told her, pain in his eyes as the memory came back.
"I really can't explain it. No one ever told me. And I can't remember anything from those few months." He could see that she was struggling too. She had a hard time not being able to remember what happened to her for such a long period of time. Especially since she normally remembers everything in such detail.
"It's okay." her sister comforted her. "What matters is that you're alive. And that we got you back."
Then Meredith's pager went off again. She growled, annoyed.
"It's fine. Go." Lexie told her, chuckling.
"No, it's not that important anyway," she argued.
"Go, Meredith. It doesn't look like I'm going to leave in the next few hours or so."
"Okay. I'll be back as soon as I can." she promised and went off.
Now, Mark and Lexie were alone.
"I'm sorry." she said.
He looked at her, not understanding why she was apologizing.
"I'm sorry for causing you so much pain." she elaborated, her eyes not daring to look into his. She felt so guilty about leaving him thinking she was dead, especially after what he had told her.
"Hey, no, it's not your fault." he assured her. He honestly didn't blame her for anything. She couldn't even remember.
He brushed a piece of hair out of her face. "You cut your hair."
She chuckled. He always managed to make her laugh in the most painful and serious moments. "Yeah."
"It looks cute." he admired, shooting her a smile.
"Thank you."
Chocolate brown met icy blue, and they got lost in each other's eyes for a good while.
However, Callie came in and broke the silence. "I'm sorry to interrupt... this. Whatever this is. But we need to prep you for surgery. I need to set your leg."
Lexie smiled at her. "Hello to you too."
"Right. Hey." Torres chuckled.
"You know what? I'm going to prep her. It's not like I'm gonna leave anyway, so I might as well make myself useful." Mark offered.
"Alright." Torres agreed and went to prepare herself.
Mark started preparing Lexie for the surgery while they continued to talk.
"How'd you even end up here?" he asked curiously.
"I was on a mission, and that very bad lady caught me off guard and pushed me off the edge of a building. I held onto the edge, but it was only two storeys, and I knew I would be brought here, so I let my hand slide off a little... maybe..." she explained, just now noticing how morbid that sounded.
"You jumped off a building to get to the hospital to see us?" Mark was both worried and just completely blown away by her craziness.
"I didn't jump! I just let go... I knew I'd get away with a broken bone or two. And I survived way worse." she defended herself.
"You're crazy. You know that, right?" he chuckled.
"I needed to see you. I needed to get back here."
"Thank you, I guess?" he joked, making her to laugh.
"You're welcome." she played along.
He finished putting the IV in her arm, successfully distracting her.
"Alright, you're good to go."
She smiled, then he brought her to the operating room and knelt down beside her head, gently stroking her hair.
"I'm going to stay right here." he promised. Torres didn't fight him. She knew he wouldn't get in her way, and besides, she was more than happy to see him care about something again.
As Lexie went under general anaesthesia, he kept stroking her hair, knowing it would make her feel comfortable.
Kara was going crazy in the waiting room. She was bouncing her leg nervously, pacing around, and trying to come up with a reason why no one had updated her.
Jo noticed her and went up to have a chat. "Hey. How are you doing?"
"Why hasn't anybody told me anything about my sister? Dr. Torres told me she was going into surgery three hours ago!" she snapped. But she immediately regretted it. She wasn't like this normally.
"The surgery can take up to two hours, plus prep time before and recovery afterwards. Don't worry, I'm sure you will get to see her soon." she calmed her down.
"I'm sorry. Normally, I don't snap at people. I'm not a mean person." Kara apologized.
"It's fine. You're just worried about your sister."
Then, Jo went to find Dr. Torres, Meredith, or anyone else who could tell her more about the mysterious girl.
She couldn't find any of them, so she went looking in the OR area. In the third one, she finally found them. She was confused why Dr. Torres was still operating. It looked like she had just started the surgery, but she was even more confused when she spotted Mark sitting next to the girl, stroking her hair.
Dr. Sloan was this cold plastic surgeon she barely ever saw. He didn't take time to teach interns or residents. She heard through gossip that he had lost the love of his life in that plane crash; that's why he acts like that. But then, what the hell was going on here?
She watched the surgery for a while, observing the doctors' and nurses' behavior and movements. Dr. Torres seemed slightly nervous, even though this was about as easy as it gets in orthopedic surgery, and she had done this procedure like two hundred times. 'Something was definitely off with this random girl. She wasn't actually random.'
Jo decided to scrub in to talk to someone.
"Dr. Wilson, what do you think you're doing?" Callie asked, her eyes remained focused on the exposed bone she was setting.
"I-uh..." Her eyes wandered over to Mark, who hadn't stopped what he was doing. He couldn't care less about what an unimportant resident was thinking.
"I was just wondering what I could tell her sister. She keeps asking for her, and she's going crazy in the waiting room." she explained.
"She's not her sister." Torres replied coldly, still not giving her a glance.
"What? What do you mean? What does all of this mean? Especially him." She pointed at Mark.
"None of your business, Wilson." he snapped.
"Get out now!" Callie yelled, a little angry.
Jo decided to listen to her. She didn't want to cause any trouble. She just wanted some answers. 'Why wasn't anybody telling her anything?'
When she was gone, Mark addressed what she had just said. "Sister?" he asked his best friend.
"I don't know. Some blonde brought her in and said she was her sister. I told her to wait in the waiting room, but I think it's been about four hours." she explained.
Mark figured it had something to do with that new identity or perhaps the undercover thing.
After the surgery, Lexie was back in her room, with Mark still by her side.
When she woke up, he told her that Meredith had to scrub in on a surgery with Derek that would take some time, but she would visit her later.
"You're up. Good." Callie said as she walked into the room.
"Did you fix my leg?" Lexie asked.
"I'm one of the best orthopedic surgeons in the country. You better believe I can fix a simple fracture." she joked.
"Thanks."
"It's going to take about..."
"...six to eight weeks to heal, and I should take it easy. I know." she finished the sentence for her.
Suddenly, Kara stormed into the room.
"Alex! Thank Rao!" she was relieved.
"Why didn't you update me on anything? She's awake. Why didn't you tell me?" she shouted at Callie.
"Relax, Blondie. She just woke up." she replied, annoyed. For some reason, she just couldn't stand her.
Kara turned back to her sister and saw Mark holding her hand. She was more confused than ever.
Callie decided that this was her cue to make a run for it.
"Torres! Don't leave!" her best friend desperately yelled after her, but it was too late.
"Alex? What's going on here?" Kara asked her.
"I-I- You know how I once told you that I lived a different life before I was recruited by the DEO?" she stuttered, not knowing how to start.
She received a nod and went on. "I lived in Seattle before, and I was working here. My family's here." She glanced at Mark.
"What? I'm so sorry. I didn't know that. I shouldn't have brought you here!" She felt bad again.
"No! No, Kara, I'm honestly so glad that you did. I wanted a chance to get back here for so long." she assured her with a smile on her face.
"But J'onn's not gonna be happy about you being here, right? He'll kill me!" the blonde freaked.
"No, I won't let him." Lexie told her.
Mark didn't want to leave. In fact, every fiber in his body fought against it, but he knew he had to give them a moment alone.
"I'll be right back. I'm going to get a cup of coffee." he announced, giving her a kiss on the forehead before leaving the room.
Kara shot her an excited look once Mark had left.
"Who's the doctor sexy?" she asked.
"Mark. Mark and I... have some history... very serious history." she answered.
"Come on, spill!" she yelled in excitement and sat down beside her.
She told her the whole complicated story of them, and Kara was smiling the whole time.
"It's like a fairytale!" she commented dreamily.
"It's not! The fairytale ends with me getting crushed by a plane and leaving him in pain, thinking I'm dead." Lexie corrected herself. She couldn't believe her delusion.
"But he confessed his love to you! And he promised you this big, dreamy future! And you can have that now!" she argued.
'Maybe she was right...' Lexie thought.
Mark had watched them, or rather just her, from the outside, not wanting to interrupt but still keeping his eye on her.
He watched every move she made, but he still had to pinch himself to make sure this was real. Then their eyes locked, and by the look in her eyes, he could tell that she wanted him to come back.
He got back inside.
"I can see why they call you McSteamy." Kara said, eyeing him up and down, pulling her glasses down slightly.
Mark chuckled.
Kara could feel the tension filling the whole room, so she knew she needed to leave.
"You know what? I think you're in pretty good hands here, so I'm going to sleep at a hotel for the night. I also have to make sure that Mon-El doesn't do anything stupid." she said and excused herself.
"Yeah, you should do that." Lexie laughed.
"See you tomorrow."
"Bye."
The door closed behind her, and they were alone.
"So, uh, I've told you the brief story of what happened to me. Now it's your turn." Lexie started. She was really curious to know, especially about what happened with Julia. 'Was she still around? Or worse, did they get married? Maybe they have a kid already? Did she steal the future he had promised her?'
"I... nothing really happened in my life. Not really..." Mark brushed it off. He didn't want to tell her how he gave up on everything and how badly he treated the people who tried to help him. He didn't want to tell her how weak he was.
"Come on. I wanna know. Tell me anything." she was persistent.
"Lex, I can't tell you anything because I haven't done anything. My life has stood still since that plane crash. I couldn't live without you. I spend my nights at Joe's downing one glass after the other to just numb the pain. I haven't been a good guy... I've treated every single person around me badly, just because I was pissed off at the universe for taking you away from me and for not letting me go with you." he admitted, ashamed.
She put her hand on top of his. "I'm sorry."
"This is not your fault. I'm responsible for my actions. I should've tried to be better because of you." he realised, but it had been so hard.
"What happened to Julia?" Lexie needed to know. The question wouldn't leave her head.
"I broke up with her the second I saw her after the crash. She came to see me at the hospital and said she loved me, but I told her... that I love you." he intentionally changed to present tense, hoping she'd notice.
Of course she noticed, but she wasn't sure if he actually just said that and if he still meant it.
"Do you? Still love me?" she asked without thinking. She was so tired of wasting time, just because she was scared to get hurt.
Mark looked at her, a little taken aback by the direct question, but he let his instincts guide him. He felt himself lean closer to her, slowly pressing his lips to hers.
