Peter and Karen

Chapter 9: First Steps

Kara walked around in costume of the Baxter building. It was strangely quiet as her footsteps echoed against the hallways. It was strange, normally she could hear someone doing something. Johnny and Ben weren't the quietest of people, especially if they were getting into it with each other. The kids were nowhere to be seen either.

Kara check Reed's lab to find it dark and empty, so she checks other rooms. All of them had the lights turned off and no one was in them. Now she's starting to worry as she finds the kitchen, and everyone is sitting at the table.

"Oh, so this is where you all are," She pauses. None of them are moving and in fact they are all facing away from her. "Hello?"

She walks at a quicker pace to get around the table and gasps. They are all there but with no faces, it's just a smooth surface. They all turn to face her, and she can tell they are looking at her. Even though they have no eyes they are looking right at her.

"Who are you?" They all say in one voice.

"I-It's me, it's Karen," She takes a step back from them. "What happened to you?!"

"Karen? Who's that? Who's Karen?" They all say but they don't stop. They just keep on repeating it over and over and over again.

Power Girl can't stand it she can't stand those words as she flees the room. She runs down the hallway asking for help, asking if anyone is there that can help her.

In a doorway she sees the figure of Superman, not the one she met earlier, or the one from her previous world. Her Superman, the original one, she can tell from the grey hair at the temples.

"Clark! Help me please!" She turned him around only to see the blank face staring at her again.

"Who are you?"

"No!" She screams and runs away. The hallway is impossibly long as more and more people she knew but all with blank faces asking who she was. She came to a closed door and rushed through it, banging it open. The room was dark except for a single spotlight with Spider-Man's back to her.

"Please, if anyone knows me, please let it be you?" She runs around to his front only to see it's still his back. She runs around him in a circle, but she can never find the front. "Please, help me, you've done it before."

He only silently points to the left. She looks to see a mirror there that hadn't been there before. She's scared of the mirror she knows something isn't right with it. She sees him still pointing as she slowly goes to the mirror. She gets up to it and sees in her reflection he own.

Only she has no face.

She screams as her hands go up to try and feel for her face.

Kara woke up with a start, sweating and panting for breath in her bed. She looked around to see the sun rising as she quickly reached up to touch her face. She could feel she still had a face as she remembers the nightmare. Falling back onto her bed she stares up at the ceiling as she places an arm over her eyes.

She tries to take a few calming breaths, trying to get her racing heart to slow down.

"Rao, that better not be a sign of things to come," she prayed to the main god of her people. That suddenly made her pause thinking about it. Did even her gods know who she was? That was a thought that chilled her to her core. What would happen to her when she died? Go to some afterlife in this universe or her own? Was she even recognized as a follower of Rao? Did her gods even exist in this reality?

"Okay stop Kara, one emotional crisis at a time," she breathed.

Finally calming down she got out of bed and headed for the shower, she needed to feel of the hot water to wash away the nightmare. It was already getting fuzzy but the parts about not having faces stuck with her. Realizing that she had her first therapy appointment today didn't do much to make her feel relieved. Granted mental health was something that Kryptonians prided themselves on, she just didn't know how her people did it as she was forced to leave home at a young age and the virtual environment, she grew up in was designed to make keep her mentally healthy.

She wished she knew how it worked back home because here on Earth (or any Earth by this point) they seemed to be still struggling with it. She just hoped that they could help her, honestly with all the things she had been through in the last few years and recently it felt like a struggle to keep herself going.

The worst part out of all of this was that she had nothing from home to latch on to. The first time back on in her home reality, she had her cousin and access to the Fortress. When she regained her memories, it was harder, but she had some small things to cling to. Now she had nothing, and she was finding it so much harder to feel grounded. She felt like her life was her, trying to climb a hill of loose sand and it kept shifting and she kept sliding back down.

After cleaning up and getting dressed she looked at the time. She could get in a nice breakfast with the FF family and have some time before she had to meet with Doctor Sampson. Maybe she would just walk around the block a few times or get a coffee or something. She felt some anxiety at doing this, but she wanted to get better, she needed to get better, and she had to start somewhere.

-Later-

Karen was dressed in regular street clothes as she stood outside a New York town house. She was in white pants and sleeveless shirt combo that she liked as she walked up the stairs to the buzzer. She paused before pressing it as she wasn't sure she could do this. Closing her eyes, she took a breath and pressed the little black button.

"Yes?"

"Yeah, uh…this is Karen Starr, Sue Richards made an appointment for me."

"Come right in." There was the buzz and the sound of the door unlocking. Karen opened it to find a simple home. Everything was in calm colors as a sliding door opened up. There stood a massive man, tall, broad shouldered, square jawed. The typical hero body of a heavy hitter although what really stuck out was the green hair.

"Ah welcome," Doc Sampson told her shaking her hand. "Please step inside."

He gestured to the doorway he went into, and Karen soon saw that the man had converted one of the rooms into his office. There were chairs, a couch, a work desk with filing cabinets. A wall of books as well as his diploma on the wall. There was even a plant with a little waterfall style fountain, just something that would have calmed running water sounds to the room she had to guess.

"Please take a seat," He pointed to the two facing chairs. She did as he got a notebook and sat next to her. "So, I need to ask a few questions if you don't mind."

"Go ahead."

"Very well," He had a nice smile she figured very disarming. "Is this your first-time seeking therapy?"

"Yes."

"Do you have any medical conditions I should be aware of?"

Karen shook her head. "No nothing."

"That's good, physical health is just as important as mental health and both can effect the other," Sampson explained. They went through a few more questions until he started to get to the core of the matter.

"So, Sue didn't go into detail only that you could use some help."

Karan had a short dark laugh at that. "Putting it mildly."

Sampson leaned back a little. "Well then, let's start at the top?"

Karen sighed. "Well, you asked for it…I guess we should start when my home planet was destroyed…"

Kara put it all out there, the loss of Krypton, how she had 'grown up' in a simulated world inside of the capsule that ended when she landed. Growing up as Supergirl, some of the things that happened to her during that time. The Crisis that merged many Earth's together. Her life as Power Girl, then a few years ago regaining all her memories of her previous life. Being 'kicked' out of her reality and ending up here, going back 'home' to find out that home again, no longer existed.

"I see," Sampson made notes out of all of this. "You have been through a lot."

"Thanks," Power Girl said glumly.

"Don't take it lightly, you've been through so much more than most people. You experienced loss on a scale most can't even comprehend but you're still here. You're here, trying to patch yourself up and move on, to keep going." Sampson said gently to her. "There are people who would have simply given up by this point."

Karen looked at her hands not saying anything at first. "I almost did."

"But you didn't and that's important," Sampson told her. "Little victories can lead up to major victories over time."

"I've had help," she countered feeling like it was a hollow victory because of it.

"We all need help," He offered his counter point. "If people just helped each other out just a little I feel the world would be a better place. It's not a weakness to ask for help or to take help that's offered."

"It's just," She was feeling so frustrated with everything. "I can pick up a tank like someone can pick up a ball, I can fly faster than sound, I can burn things with just looking at them, freeze things by breathing at them and I can hear two people screaming at each other from the one of them hitting the other's car five blocks from here at this moment. I can be shot at, burned, hell you can hit me with a battleship, and I can still get up."

"I can do all that, yet why do I feel so weak all the time? Why do I feel like I'm made of glass and I'm going to break?" She asked him to look him in the eyes almost begging for an explanation.

The man sighed as she reached over to grip her hand locking eyes with her. "You're not used to being hurt, especially like this. Physical pain is something that goes away with time but emotional and mental pain, that's harder to see. We don't see the scars in our minds or the open wounds we carry with them."

"They can bring even the strongest of us down, but you've taken the first steps today to really start to heal and I promise you. This is only temporary, and with time you will feel better about everything."

"I hope so, because I hate how I feel right now." Power Girl dropped her eyes.

"Well talking about these things help," Sampson said. "Times like this it's best to have other people around as you might feel the need to isolate yourself from the world, but I can tell you that will only make things worse."

Kara guessed she might as well try, it looked like she was going to be here full time now. Just thinking about going back through Reed's device to that world only made her feel even worst. It was like she couldn't even think about going back without making her feel physically ill. Not that she had anything worth going back for.

Their session continued for a bit longer and by the end she wasn't sure if she felt better or not. Doctor Sampson said it was a process and that it would take time. After leaving the office she went back to the Baxter building to change in her costume and just fly. Flying always made her feel free, she always would just fly up to be alone and just relax before.

Feeling the wind against her as she flew up through the clouds she just floated there. She shut out any outside stimuli and just concentrated on floating. Closing her eyes, she focused on her hearing and just wanted to listen. Sometimes in the past she would just listen to the sounds of the streets. Children playing, a dog happily yelping at their owner's return. Some teens were gathered around listening to some music while talking about classes.

Just regular stuff, no crime or anything like that. She just listened to the sounds of people going about their regular life and she found it somewhat relaxing. It reminded her that no matter what, life went on.

-Later-

Peter was sitting on a building with the lower section of his mask pulled up eating a crawler and nursing his ribs. He had just finished a whole fight with Scorpion, and he needed something to pick him up. The whole thing had been that Scorpion had busted into company to take what looked like some kind of prototype device. It was large and needed someone with super strength to carry it. Most likely Gargan had been hired by someone to steal it. Most likely some rival company taking corporate espionage to the super powered level.

He might have to look into that in case there would be more or if this was a one-time thing. There was a short list of the usual suspects for him. A.I.M. being at the top they love their super science, could be a company like Roxxon but good luck proving anything. That company was like Teflon with how nothing stuck to them. Oscorp was also on the top five of his lists of evil companies. Given that the company was ran with an on again-off again super villain (one of his worst enemies actually) nothing they did could surprise him.

There was that new company Alchemax, he had been warned by Miguel of how bad they got in the year 2099 so that was one of the things he was trying to keep an eye on when he could.

"Where would I even start?" He muttered to himself. Maybe if he knew what the prototype was about it could help narrow who might be interested. It was at least safely returned so maybe the company might be helpful? Big MIGHT there though. He couldn't get anything out of Scorpion because the guy slipped into the sewers and Peter knew from experience with the lead the villain had on him there wasn't a good chance of finding him.

Seriously, people just didn't understand how large the sewer system was. All the times he had to chase people like The Lizard down there it was always this huge maze. Not to mention all the other things that live down there. There was a whole group of people Morbius was leading at one point, then the Morlocks, which now that he thought about it, he was surprised he never came across them at some point. Now he was starting to wonder if even the Mole Man had people down there.

"Deep in thought?" a familiar female voice spoke up next to him.

"Ahhh." Peter wasn't used to people sneaking up on him as he dropped his food. A blur quickly went down and passed it back to him. "Thanks, and also please don't scare me like that."

Power Girl smirked as she floated next to him. "Thought nothing could sneak up on you?"

"Only if it's attacking me," He paused. "So…how did today go?"

Karen crossed her arms and frowned as she leaned against the building. "I'm not sure, I mean mostly I just talked about myself, what happened to me, a few other things."

"Out of all the doctor's I've known and been to I haven't really interacted with him, so I don't know how he does things." Peter shrugged. "I mean Reed is a doctor, then there's Doctor Strange, I guess you can count Doctor Doom-no wait he just calls himself Doctor, he's not actually one."

"Wait someone calls himself Doctor Doom? What is he, a mad scientist or something?" She asked confused as normally people that use doctor in their names usually are one. Well, there was Doctor Fate so maybe it was like that?

"Think one-part mad scientist, one part sorcerer and all dictator of a small country that wants to rule the world." He shrugged taking the last bite out of his meal.

Power Girl blinked at him. "I can't tell if you're joking or not."

"Funny thing is I'm being one hundred percent serious," He explained. "Look up Latveria at some point."

Karen sighed, "I'll add it to the list of things I need to look up."

"Can't be easy, learning about a whole planet's history from scratch."

"Again," She muttered this not being the first time she had to do this. She floated there next to him just looking at the new of the city. "Maybe when I feel up to it, I'll just fly around the planet a little. Do some good here and there."

"Well, that sounds awesome," Peter barely left the city. Mainly because of two reasons, it was only him and a handful of people that looked out for the little guy in the city and the other being money. It wasn't cheap to just fly off to somewhere for a vacation. "I swear the only time I get to fly some where is if the Avengers need me and we're off to some location to fight someone doing something evil and or planet endangeringly stupid.

"Endangeringly?" she smirked. "Pretty sure that's not a world."

"Maybe not on your world but it is here."

Karen paused for a moment. "Oh, don't pull that crap on me!" She knew he was lying.

"How do you know?"

"Your heart rate spiked!"

"Maybe I'm just blinded by your beauty?" Peter threw out before he could think of anything. He winced under his mask, not the best thing to throw out even if she was one of the most beautiful women he met.

Kara paused again as she had still been listening to his heartbeat. Looking away she looked back over the city. "Just…don't mess with me like that, I sill have issues with things like that."

"Right, sorry, that sounded funnier in my head." He apologized.

"It's okay." She sighed calming down knowing he didn't mean anything by it. She was just trying to get solid footing under her and having someone mess with her like that wasn't helping.

There was a moment of silence before he broke it. "So super hearing, you ever use that in poker nights to tell if someone is bluffing?"

"I didn't get many offers for playing," she then grinned. "For that exact reason."

Both of them let out small laughs at that.

"Don't tell anyone, but I tend to do great at the guy's poker nights because my spider-sense actually warns me not to bet against someone with a better hand."

"Wait, really?" She asked surprised by that.

"Oh yeah, no one's figured it out because I still fold with losing hands but when I got a winning hand, I know it and play to that." Peter then shrugged. "Might not be fair but it's not like I can turn it off."

"You think you know someone," She shook her head and then thought about it. "Actually, now that I think about it. You're one the closest friends I have and yet I know barely anything about you. I'm pretty sure you know more about me than mostly anyone else by this point."

Peter felt a bit bad about that, he guessed you could say that he had his own issues to work through. He could tell her who he was, everything that happened to him to make up for it, but he always kept pulling back. A lot of the people that knew both sides of his life weren't in his life anymore one way or another. Not to mention what he had asked Steven to do, all because he believed in Tony Stark during that whole Registration Act that had split the hero community.

He knew it wasn't fair to keep her at a distance. Maybe he could explain why he did so, then maybe she could understand.

"The whole world knew who I was at one point," Peter started as she looked at him.

"Another thing to look up is the Superhuman Registration Act and the storm that caused." He started to explain to her. "I listened to Tony and exposed my identity to the world. Well, it backfired. People I loved were targeted, my aunt was shot and…well things were bad."

"So, I went to Steven Strange, Tony Stark and Reed and had them come up with a spell, I made it so that the world forgot my real identity, well a few people still knew but the vast majority of the world forgot." He explained to her although it was a very simplistic version of the events. He really didn't want to go too deep into it given everything that had happened during that time.

Power Girl was shocked by this he had literally erased his own history or at least part of it.

"You see this 'amnesia storm' as he called it, well I remember everything and anyone that did know who I am under this mask, well if I tell them, then all their memories are returned." He hated how that sounded but it was the only way to protect those closest to him.

She had to take a moment to process all this before she could speak again. "Where you really that desperate?"

"Yeah, I was, because I couldn't protect those closest to me." He said looking at his hands. "I got all these powers but when the world knew who I was? The two closest people to me nearly died, they became targets, and I just couldn't live with it. Because of my actions, because of my mistake, their lives would have been on me. I put them into danger, and I had to fix it."

Power Girl thought about what some of the League did to Dr. Light and a few other villains, how Zatanna had erased their memories and in Dr. Light's case altered his personality. She hadn't been involved in the event, but she had heard all about it. Honestly, she had been split on it, the villains would have and in Dr. Light's case, did go after those close to heroes. What Dr. Light had done in particular made her sick to her stomach.

She was also feeling torn because of her own life having been erased not once but twice over. Suddenly getting all her memories back from her original life had taken her months to come to terms with, after Psycho Pirate had broken whatever mental wall she had in her head, and she had been flooded with new memories.

Then thinking about what he said about those being close to him being a target struck a nerve with her. She thought of those who had been close to her and what she could do to keep them safe.

"Did the Fantastic Four know who you were?"

Peter sighed and nodded. "Yeah…I…I haven't been able to tell them yet. They've always been good to me but after everything I went through, I guess you could say I got some trust issues to deal with."

"Glad to know I'm not the only one with issues," Power Girl stared out at the city. "They are good people."

"I know and I think I will tell them…when I'm ready." He nodded as he too stared out at the city. There were a few people he should tell, he wants to tell Black Cat as she knows something is off given the last time they talked. He misses how close he used to be with her. There were a few others that might tell again. Logan if he hasn't figured it out again, he might as well tell. That nose of his is how he figured out his identity in the first place.

Maybe Cap, that is a man he can trust as for Tony…no, not Tony. At least not yet, too many scars still healing from the past with him. His Aunt he could tell again, yes, she would be worried for him again, but he liked how supportive she had been when she had known. He smirked under his mask as he remembered her mailing the Daily Bugle daily to change their stories on Spider-Man and even given JJ a piece of her mind about it.

It was just so hard to open up, because opening up is what got them all into trouble. It was also one of the reasons his personal life was so much trouble. MJ knew his identity but couldn't take seeing him get hurt all the time and left, Black Cat liked the Spider side more than him and so she left, Charlie liked Peter and Spider-Man but not as the same person, so she left. Then of course all the secrets that he kept from them and other women in his life and how that ended up hurting them as well in different ways.

It was like no matter what he tried he just couldn't make it work. If there was some secret or combination to try he had no idea.

"So, I guess I got another power, the power of depression given how quiet we are." Power Girl sighed.

"Pretty sure everyone has that superpower, I'm no stranger to it." Peter shrugged. "I do know of a way to help deal with it."

She cocked an eyebrow at him. "Oh?"

"So out on patrol and help someone." Peter said simply. "It helps me out at least, knowing that I helped someone from having a really bad day."

Karen could get behind that idea as she listened to the city. All the sounds that came with it, it took her awhile to get good enough to learn how to filter it all out, for it to just become white noise while she tried to find someone yelling for help, breaking glass, the sound of a weapon being cocked. She cocked her head as something interesting caught her attention.

"I think I hear a couple of men talking about burning down a building for insurance." Karen told him.

Peter quickly looked at her, he had no idea she was that good. "Well lead on and let's see if we can persuade our would-be fire bugs that this is a no smoking city."

"Right this way," She flew off with him diving off the building towards her direction.

TBC…