Pre-Story Authors Notes:

Greetings everybody, I'm Miracle and my husband Ghost is standing behind me. To our returning readers, welcome to Episode 3 of our Enigmaverse Saga! This story is completely stand-alone to the previous two entries, though there are small references readers of Gemini Curse and Blessing will recognise. To our new readers, it's great to have you! For the past several years now, we've been building what we call the 'Enigmaverse': a collection of stories within the same canon, with the intention of building up to an Avengers level crossover. If you want to check out the previous entries – hit our blue username (Ghost-and-Miracle42) above! You totally don't need to have read them to understand this. It's entirely stand-alone.

This story – while obviously staring everyone's favourite Kryptonian – is big-time AU. This is a story about Kara Zor El and her journey from nothing to the hero of Earth – a hero believed by many to be a messiah. We wanted to tell a story grounded in reality, analysing what we think would really happen if someone like Superman or Supergirl landed on Earth. This is that story, featuring, of course, appearances from everyone's favourite LCorp CEO; Alex Danvers, aka the best big-sister ever; Barbara 'I'm a genius' Gordon; and, wait for it, Lex Luthor, who if you can believe it, wasn't always evil!

Our inspirations for this piece – which we're quite proud of – come obviously from the Supergirl tv series, but they also come from the Supergirl comics. Specifically, Supergirl (Vol 5 #34-67) – New Krypton – and Supergirl (Vol 7 #1-20) – Rebirth. If you want some recommended reading, drop us a line and we'd be more than happy to help. We've also taken major inspiration from Supergirl: Being Super by Mariko Tamaki and Joëlle Jones. It's a standalone graphic novel published by DC in 2018 and is probably the best Supergirl story either of us have ever read. We highly recommend giving it a look. As a final note on influences, Barbara's characterisation comes mainly from the Batgirl of Burnside by Cameron Stewart, Brenden Fletcher and Babs Tarr.

We should also say here that the Disclaimers are back! They'll start up with chapter 2!

DISCLAIMER: We do not own DC Comics, or any of the other fandoms we've used in the fusion. Duh. But Alcheringa does belong to us.

Chapter One: Those Early Days

The Present Day: December 14th, 2010; Suicide Slum, Metropolis, Kent County, Delaware – 38° 58'19.9 "N 75° 21'24.9 "W

*Believe it or not, Kent County is a real place in Delaware. Type the coordinates above into Google Maps to find the location of Metropolis.

The chair had survived. Lena supposed it shouldn't surprise her. The piece of garbage was incredibly resilient. The ratty leather armchair – missing an arm and featuring a giant rip across the side – was still right where they'd left it. Sitting in the corner of a one-room red brick building on the verge of collapse, deep within the Southside District of Metropolis. Or, as it was more commonly known: Suicide Slum.

It honestly was incredible. Twelve years since they'd escaped this hell-hole, and no one had taken the stupid, fucking chair. Everything else was gone. The curtains. The door. The radio her mother had prized so much. The stash of drugs her father kept hidden beneath the crack in the concrete slab they used as a floor. Even the wires from the light switch were gone. But the chair still sat there. Covered in dust and dirt.

With an odd feeling of reverence for the old couch, she gently sat down and leaned into the hard, cracked leather. She sighed, biting her lip. She'd hoped… hoped that maybe the chair would smell like her mother. But the only aroma here was the dust kicked up from the demolition plant down the street.

"Lena?" A shadow darkened the doorway – the door long since stolen.

"In here," Lena called back. The figure resolved into that of a young woman. Long blonde hair cacked with dirt; an oil-stained grey smock that looked like a bag on her athletic form; worn baggy jeans, ripped not for stylistic reasons. This woman looked nothing like the goddess worshipped across the globe: the saviour of mankind. Here, in Suicide Slum, Kara Zor El was just as forgotten as everyone else.

Kara walked inside, stepping hesitantly in worn Nikes. Then she slid down the brick wall and came to a rest on the floor, hands on knees.

"Lillian's chair? It's still here?"

"Apparently," Lena said, patting the armrest that remained. They sat in silence for a long while, just listening to the sounds of crushing metal, the beeping of reversing trucks and the engines of cars. It was nice to imagine, just for a moment, being children again, running through those streets. But all moments have their end.

"He's about to start," Kara said softly, pulling out a phone entirely at odds with her attire. Lena transitioned to the floor beside her, and Kara placed her phone on its side so they could both see the scene unfold.

The video was of a courtroom, filled to the brim with reporters and spectators. Being led down the central aisle, wearing an immaculate black suit and green tie, was Lena's brother, and Kara's oldest friend.

Lex was shoved into a seat, and the chains around his hands locked to the wooden desk before him. Someone called for silence, slamming a gavel, and eventually, the audience grew quiet.

"Mr Luthor," a voice called from off-screen. The camera remained fixed on Lex, not moving from that smug face, those burning eyes, for a second. "The crimes charged are as follows: three-hundred and twelve counts of murder in the first degree, treason against the United States Government, tax-evasion and fraud. How do you plead?"

Lex grinned, standing up. Every person in the room tensed for some bizarre reason that Lena didn't understand. Surely, they knew if he wanted them dead, they'd already be dead right? Being in chains made no difference. Not for him.

"Not guilty your honour." Kara and Lena had both expected it, as, no doubt, had the judge. It didn't stop the guests from gasping.

"You're… certain, Mr Luthor? The evidence against you is incontrovertible."

"That's never stopped him before," Kara and Lena whispered together.

"I am most definitely certain your honour, for I have the perfect defence—a mandate from a much higher authority than your own. I was a warrior in service of God, Judge Mackintosh, until I reached too far, and was struck down for it. Let me now, jurors, members of the press, and people of the world, speak for you the truth. Let my last act be not as the herald of peace I had envisioned, but as the man who wields the knife that would bring down a false God!"

The audience exploded in chaos.

"ORDER, ORDER! Silence in the court!" The judge barked, but no one listened. Instead, the network broadcasting the live trial across the world went to break.

"And so it begins," Kara whispered, "How much good can he undo in a matter of hours do you think?"

"As much as possible. He… he doesn't care anymore. All the hard work we did together, building a better world, saving millions of people, it means nothing compared to his craving for vengeance. Vengeance against us."

Lena, tears in her eyes, leant her head against Kara's shoulder. Then, together, they cried in memory of a brother who had once, so long ago, been kind and dedicated to protecting them through the darkest parts of the night.

A lifetime ago. 1987; Delaware, the United States of America

Kara huddled, legs tucked to chest, against the trunk of a tall, gnarled tree in the middle of the night. The lush green plants surrounding her were taller than any she had seen before… before what? Her head hurt so much. Her skull was pounding, beating with its own pulse. Why was everything so loud! She could hear voices, so many voices, all of them speaking in a language she didn't understand. And there were these rumbling sounds, constant and coming from every direction. The sound of each footstep she took was deafening. And… and… she was… who was she? She was Kara… Kara… Kara Z… Z something. The rumbling grew unbearable, and she tried desperately to cover her ears. It did nothing. Lights shone out from around the corner – two of them – and a metal box on wheels appeared in the darkness. The rumbling… it was … it was a machine inside making the sound, and the wheels rolling on the ground. The box passed by her hiding place, vanishing into the dark, and Kara breathed a sigh of relief as the noise dulled back into the background.

What had she done? Had she been bad? Why was she here? Where was here? Why couldn't she think? She was Kara… Kara something. But what? She remembered… Flashes. Screams. Heat. Red skies. Darkness. No matter how hard she tried, she could see nothing but disjointed images. Nothing made sense! Why was there green? There shouldn't be green! And so many trees. Trees were rare, and they weren't green… right? But the trees were green, and so were the other plants – bunched up stalk-like structures that grew almost to her shoulders. She… she had no word for them. Couldn't… Oh, Rao. What was this?

She wrapped herself as tightly as she could to hide from the cold, and the noise – as if her arms could block out anything.

Kara remembered little of her journey through the sea of trees the next day. Freezing, body aching, skin exposed to the biting wind, she made her way towards the voices she could hear. She could focus more in the daylight. The sounds were less overwhelming. Instead, she trudged through the endless green, staring in wonder at the flying creatures that flitted through the trees. She did not have a word for these things, so she called them sky-singers for the sweat songs they sang to one another as the yellow light filtered through the leaves. She travelled through the whole day, and only when the yellow-sun vanished would she collapse – all her energy and strength failing her. There she would find a place to hide from the wind, and rock back and forth trying to block out the sounds, which came back with a vengeance. Only when the silver-sun reached its peak was she capable of sleep, when – late in the night – the sounds began to ease. She always woke with no tiredness or cramp under the yellow sun, then she would rise and continue her journey. For surely other people could help her find her parents… people who knew her.

It was that thought that forced her forward. Clinging to the belief that at the end of her road, she would find herself. For Kara could not understand the place she found herself in, with its yellow light and green plants, and she didn't remember anything before waking in the place of trees.

Eventually, after days of walking, without even thinking about food or drink, Kara came to a fence of wire, and on the other side was a sense of familiarity. The trees were only in cultivated yards, and the green gave way to buildings of metal and brick. The noises were far more powerful here, overpowering the sky-singers. The speaking of people – which she still could not understand – and the rumbling of the metal box machines. There was also a soft humming that emanated from the houses, though she did not understand this. Fortunately, the constant intake of sound had stopped being painful now, even at night – though she still struggled to concentrate when the yellow-sun was not in the sky. The silver-sun made her feel sleepy and sore. The yellow-sun did not. She didn't understand why that was, but she understood enough. The yellow-sun was falling to the horizon now, so Kara decided to stay in the place of trees for just one more night. Then she would search for home… for…

She sank down beside a tree and began to cry once more. She couldn't even remember her home. She cried herself to sleep again, until she was jolted awake by light, and voices. A hand rested on her shoulder as she tried to blink away the brightness, and she jerked away, scooting backwards across the dirt and green stalks – which were shorter near the fence, only covering her feet. The light followed her, shining in her eyes. It was still night, but the light was blinding all the same.

"Please stop!" she begged, and the voices ceased. The light moved away from her face, and she had to blink the spots out of her eyes. When she could finally see, she could make out two tall people – covered in clothes – with short black hair on their heads and faces. They spoke once more, but Kara could not understand the words. One of the men reached out with his hand, and Kara inched further backwards in response. The man called to her in a soothing voice, but when she didn't move, he turned to the other man and said something further. The other man nodded, before withdrawing a small machine from his clothes and holding it to his ear. He talked into the machine, and Kara could hear a voice reply from inside the machine. Was there a spirit trapped inside? Was it enslaved?

She screamed, rising to her feet and running away. One man, the one without the spirit, gave chase, but if they were together, then he must be evil too, so she kept running. Back into the place of trees. But the silver-sun was high in the darkness, and it stole her strength, so soon she collapsed to the leaves and green stalks, heavy breathing. It did not take long for the man to find her. He tried to approach, holding his hands outwards to capture her. A spirit! He must think her a spirit to capture. Kara panicked and tried to crawl away again. Her face was hot, and her eyes began to itch through her tears. This was it. She was to be trapped in a machine! Never to return home… to… to…

She spun around and screamed in fear as the man advanced. Her eyes burned, and twin beams of blue heat shot from them, through the man's chest and into the treetops. She screamed again as the man fell to the ground on his face, crumpling into a ball and clenching her eyes closed.

It took a long time, but Kara eventually pried her eyes open. The man remained where he fell. How had she done that? She felt so tired. She could barely hear the sounds around her anymore. But she could hear some things. A rumbling machine. Nearby. And the steps of the other man as he came closer.

Slowly, she crawled over to the man and poked him. No response. She continued to poke him, but nothing happened. She pushed him over and prodded at his face. He didn't move. Was he sleeping? He must be because he wasn't moving. She looked up and bit her lip, heart racing as a light appeared in the distance. She looked back to the sleeping man and his button shirt. It had a strange pattern, like different coloured squares, except for the two holes her eyes had made. Taking things was bad she knew, her mother had told her that, but she was so cold, and he was big, so he wouldn't need it, right? The other man was calling in that voice, shinning his small light. He was getting closer. She moved.

She pulled the shirt from the man and wrapped it around herself. Then she ran, deep into the place of trees, fleeing from the voices and the men and their spirits.

The Present Day…

"Kara Zor El was no saint sent to Earth by God as the holy men claim. She was not some wholesome being born of kindness. She was a little girl, and even then she showed her true colours, as a murderer,"Lex Luthor snarled into his microphone. The audience sat, speechless as Lex gave his testimony. He represented himself at this trial – after all, he would have only the best to defend him, and he was the best.

He had tried to show them all the truth of 'Supergirl'. To show them how, at her heart, she was as corrupted as the rest of humanity. Kara was no god, for gods did not bleed, and Lex had made her do exactly that. But even after he'd shown them, shown them all that the Girl of Steel was not a god, they had still supported her. Lex was the victor! He had proved it to them all, and then they had IGNORED IT! Well, not this time. This time he would have the last laugh. It had not been enough to kill God. He would have to show them the depths of her betrayal instead. And no one could do that better than Lex Luthor. Godkiller… it certainly had a nice ring to it.

1987; Suburban Metropolis, Delaware

Kara Zor El. That was her name. How had she forgotten that? It just… it made no sense. She was Kara Zor El. Always had been. Always would be. Kara Zor El, daughter of Zor and… and… She shook her head and continued through the alleyway. She'd remember eventually. She just needed food.

It had been three days since she'd fled from the two men, and she was feeling incredibly guilty. Everyone in the city had those small machines, and they weren't speaking to spirits, they were actually talking to other people. She really had panicked, but in her defence, they'd been shining that light at her, and it had been night-time, and she'd been scared. Still, she'd made a promise to herself that, if she saw them again, she would apologise.

Kara stepped out of the alley and walked down the street, taking care not to get in the way of the few adults on the path. She was still near the outskirts of the city – she'd seen from a vantage point yesterday that it stretched on for great distances in all directions, but there was nothing she recognised, and no new memories had surfaced. So, she'd tried to talk to people. No one could understand her words, and she could not understand theirs. She knew she'd learnt language early, her mother… her mother had been a… She'd been good with words, and she'd taught Kara at an early age, but these people did not speak anything vaguely close to what Kara knew. With talking not an option, Kara had decided to journey through the city – headed towards the centre – in the hope that she would see something or someone she remembered. She'd take anything at this point. She still wore the shirt with the strange pattern. It hung on her like a gown, brushing just below her knees, and she'd rolled up the long sleeves so she could use her hands freely. At night she would find a space between buildings and sleep through the darkness. Sometimes others would sleep in the alleys, sometimes she would be alone, so she didn't think there was anything wrong with it.

She continued down towards the centre, now very conscious of her aching stomach. It amazed her that she'd simply forgotten to eat as she travelled through the place of trees. Eating was very important. Her ability to hear things far away had returned that first day – though it was weaker than with the trees. It had grown stronger each day since then, but she found she could control it better now. Focus her hearing in a way that allowed her to push all the extra sounds into the background. It was lucky too because there were just so many sounds in the city.

Right now, she was focussing her hearing on one thing, in particular, the sound of crunching food. She thought perhaps it was a triothal fruit, as they made crisp crunching sounds when eaten. Though, if you had asked her what a triothal fruit was, she would be unable to tell you. Sure enough, after a short while of walking, she came across a building with lots of foods of different colours displayed on tables. She could see the person she'd focussed on, a woman with dark hair, biting into a red fruit of a circular shape. Deciding that this fruit must taste good, she grabbed one from the tables and took a bite.

It was sweeter than she expected, but it certainly crunched well, and her teeth tingled as they bit into the flesh. She swallowed, and her stomach grumbled, craving more. She took another bite and started looking around the other tables. There were so many different colours. She'd never seen anything like it. Back home everything was made by machines, so while they tasted different, most of the time things were the same colours. Browns, whites, blacks, greys...

Kara stopped still, trying hard to focus on the memory, trying to form it in her mind. She thought… she thought she might be able to recognise a face, then it slipped through her fingers. She tried harder. Red skies, blonde hair, stone walls, cold metal, screams, then a flash of green, and a planet tore itself in half.

She screamed in fright, stumbling backwards into a man. She spun around, breath quickening, and came face to face with an old man, hair greyed, wearing an apron with a message of strange squiggles on a piece of metal pinned to his breast. He spoke to her in that other language, and Kara tried to back away. The man's face turned dark, and he reached out, grabbing her wrist. Then he pulled the fruit from her hand. He tried speaking to her again, then seemingly gave up and started looking around, shouting. He had drawn quite a commotion by this point, and people were stopping to look. Kara, whole body trembling in fright – both from the memory and from the man's grip – slapped her hand against the man's arm in an attempt to break his grip.

It worked, and the man jerked back with a howl of pain. Kara ran, ducking around the tables, fruit forgotten. She made her way back out to the paths and ran down the light ground path – weaving between walkers as voices screamed behind her. She had learnt on her first day that the larger dark coloured path that ran between the light paths on either side was for the metal boxes, not for people.

She lost track of time as she ran, tears in her eyes. Eventually, as the yellow-sun started to fall away, she found another alley, though this one was far less clean than others she had stayed in, and huddled down next to a tall plastic box, coloured green. She was still hungry – the single bite of the fruit not enough to sate her – so when the smell of food entered her nostrils, she couldn't help reaching into the box and poking around for something she was familiar with. She found a brownish food that was crisp and chewy, and it tasted bland, but it was food, and it would have to do.

The next day, when she woke up, Kara was no longer in the alley where she'd fallen asleep. Instead, she was in a dark room, surrounded by other people, with metal chains on her arms and feet. Her back rested against a wall – a wall of metal. Shocking awake, her hearing returned, and the whimpering and crying of the people in the room became as loud as if they were yelling. Then there was the rumbling that surrounded them. With a start, she realised she was inside one of the metal moving boxes. How had she gotten here? Why hadn't she woken up? She shivered and tried to take steady breaths. She pulled on the chains, trying to pull free, and they snapped with ease. She broke the bindings on her feet as well, unaware of the impossibility of what she had done, and stood up. Two figures wearing black, seated at the head of the small space copied her movements, barking at her in their language. She ignored them, looking around, trying to figure out just what was going on. Five more people were in the machine with her. One she recognised from the alley the previous night – a young woman with blonde hair – the others she didn't know. All were chained as she had been, and all were watching her.

"What's happening?" She tried, but none answered. One of the black-clad people raised a foot and kicked her in the chest. She fell over the bound people's legs, hitting the ground. The person who kicked her advanced, grabbing her arm and shoving her back into the wall. He muttered to himself as he grabbed the broken chains, then stared in shock at them. Kara used the distraction to push him away from her, and the man fell back with little resistance. The other man drew a different shaped black box thing from his clothes, pointing it at her – these people really did like their black machines. She heard something 'click' sharply. Then a 'bang!' echoed in the room, and the others all screamed. Kara threw her hands to her ears and stumbled backwards as she felt something hit her leg. She glanced down as the sound dissipated, and saw a tiny piece of metal, crushed, fall to the floor. She looked back up just in time for the first man – the one who kicked her – to hit her in the face.

She expected pain, she expected force, but there was nothing. The hand bounced away from her face, and he screamed. Kara stared at his hand, heart beginning to pound. His hand was crumpled, just like metal.

Had she done that? Oh Rao, what was happening to her. She stumbled back again, tripping and falling to her butt. Her eyes burned as panic washed over her, and two beams of hot light shot forth. They sheered straight through the man with the machine – who had been staring at her in shock – and through the wall behind him. Kara heard a grunt of pain from behind the wall, then the room swerved to the right, and Kara slid into the wall. The room flipped a bunch of times, and she slammed her head into metal, once, twice, three times. Then she was falling through empty air as bright light flooded the room. Or, actually, she had broken through the wall. She hit the dark path, rolling a few times before coming to a stop. The box moving machine landed on its side, sliding to a halt. A dozen other box machines stopped around them, and she heard the wailing of alarms growing closer and closer.

She didn't wait. She simply gave in to the fear that flooded her body, and ran.

The city had broken. Here the buildings were not clean, the paths were not swept, and cracks ran through walls and floors. The people here did not wear fine clothes or shoes. Instead, they looked like Kara herself did – with ill-fitting garments, dirtied hair and skin and sunken eyes. Were these her people then?

Why could nobody hit her? How was she firing beams from her eyes? How was she so much stronger than everyone else? What was she? Did she really care?

Something had happened to her. Something that made her different to everyone else. And after days and days of wandering in the wild and in the city, nobody had found her. Nobody was looking for her. She was alone.

The Present…

"Five years. Five years spent living on the streets of Suicide Slum. The Hero of Earth, destitute, forgotten, living in alleyways, a waste of space. Using her phenomenal powers not to help people, but to steal from them and intimidate them. Even I do not know how many she killed in those early days, but undoubtedly it was more than even she remembers." Lex sat back down in his chair, and the judge called for order once more. Kara sat perfectly still in the crumbling brick house, using every ounce of her willpower not to crush the phone in her hand then and there.

"He's not wrong," She whispered to Lena, the woman she considered her sister in all but blood still leaning against her shoulder. "I was a monster back then. Those people in the woods. They were trying to help me; I killed that man. And the people in the van? I don't even know if they survived the crash."

Lena slapped her on the arm. "Don't you dare think like that. If you start doubting yourself, he wins. You were five years old Kara. You didn't know what was happening. There's a reason children that young can't be charged with crimes."

"I still did it. I did everything he said, Lena. And he's right. I probably don't remember some of the people I have killed. My memories of that time are so patchy. More feelings than actual images. Rao, we only know for certain that I did kill those people because of the police reports Lex tracked down."

"It doesn't matter Kara. You can't do anything about it now. You've saved millions, perhaps billions of lives as Supergirl. Don't let him take it away."

Lena stood up slowly, and Kara could hear her bones creaking. How long had they been sitting here?

"I'm going to take the stand tomorrow. Tomorrow, we start fighting back. I won't let my brother ruin all that we've done. I won't let Lex Luthor be the man that destroyed Supergirl – the greatest symbol of hope the world has."

Please Review! All comments and constructive criticism is welcome. Also, if we make any errors in the legal parts, be sure to point them out so we can edit them appropriately.