Hi! I don't know if you're still taking prompts, and I'm sorry if I bother you, but; what about Lena being turned into a cat by an alien weapon at the DEO and being the cutest kitten anyone has laid their eyes upon (no angst, please?)? I'm loving the Vancouver updates, btw! The food looks awesome, and the photos are great! Where did you get the NCU sweater, btw? I've been trying to get my hands on one since we saw Lena wearing it! Love, -L<3
A/N: Hi, L! The sweater is from the Supergirl Radio teepublic store. Mine is technically the men’s, as the women’s doesn’t come in screen canon colors.
Kara stares.
Alex stares.
Winn coughs a stunned, delighted laugh. “Oh, shit.”
The black cat sprawled on the DEO floor mewls, slowly coming to. The sound shifts from a purr to meow, sounding almost like a question. Green eyes blink blearily, and then a more insistent meow issues as the cat staggers awkwardly to four legs.
Kara is the first to recover. She steps towards the cat, who immediately hunkers down, ears flat against her skull as she stares up at Kara in alarm. Every muscle in the cat’s body coils tight, but there’s something all too human in the way its gaze bounces from Kara to its own paws, and then back up again.
“Lena?” Kara asks warily, edging another step closer.
The cat’s gaze jumps back to her in panic.
“MEH!”
Kara gulps.
“Ohhhh…” Winn breathes, turning slowly towards Alex. “She’s going to be so pissed.”
Lena bolts. Vasquez at least has the sense to pull the lab door shut before Lena can dart through it. Instead she slams bodily into the glass pane, unable to control too many skidding paws and a tail whipping with a mind of its own.
“Grab her!” Alex shouts, but before Vasquez can close her hands on her Lena is off again like a shot, claws scrabbling for purchase on the tiled floor.
“Don’t step on her!” Kara calls, immediately lifting to a safe hover.
“We’re not trying to!” Alex snaps as she staggers to avoid the streak of black fur that darts between her legs. “Goddamn it,” she curses. “I lost her! Who’s got eyes?”
“Negative, ma’am.”
“Nothing here,” Winn reports, scanning the floor around him.
Kara takes a quick glance herself, but doesn’t catch any sign of movement. “Okay, nobody move!” They all freeze. “And be quiet!”
Refocusing her gaze, Kara scans the room with her x-ray vision. She spots Lena’s huddled form beneath a rolling supply cart parked against the wall. Now she can hear the rapid feline heartbeat, and unhappy rumble of distress rattling in Lena’s chest.
“Okay,” Kara says softly, gently returning both feet to the ground. “Could you give us a few minutes?”
Winn hesitates. “But…”
Alex grips him firmly by the shoulder. “Yes, we can.” She guides Winn forcefully out of the room, with Vasquez trailing behind them.
“But she’s a cat!” Winn complains, before the door closes and seals Kara in alone with Lena.
Sinking onto her stomach, Kara peers under the cart where Lena cowers, panting through an open, sharp-toothed mouth.
“Hey, Lena.” Lena flinches at the sound of her voice, hackles lifting. “It’s just you and me now. It’s going to be okay.”
“Awa,” comes the plaintive response. It almost sounds like Kara’s name, but the sounds that follow are unintelligible grumblings of an unhappy cat.
Kara offers a reassuring smile. “I know. I know it’s scary, but we’ll fix it, I promise.” Lena doesn’t budge, still panting heavily as her tail twitches anxiously. “Do you think you’re ready to come out?”
Lena’s growl sharpens abruptly as Kara reaches a hand under the cart. She withdraws immediately. “Okay, it’s okay,” Kara soothes. She tries to catch Lena’s eye, but with her shoulders hunched and ears flat, the cat looks like it’s trying to pretend the world doesn’t exist. “I’ll be out here when you’re ready.”
Pushing up into a sitting position, Kara tucks her feet under her. With deep, even breaths, she half-meditates, keeping one ear on Lena while doing her best to project calm, peaceful energy. Slowly, the rumble of danger in Lena’s throat quiets, and the angry swish of her tail calms. Her heartbeat evens out, and finally, after what feels like hours, Lena finally emerges.
“Mrrow,” the cat warbles pitifully. No longer driven by pure instinct, Lena wobbles towards her on unsteady legs, placing one paw in front of the other with deliberate care. Her tail sticks straight up, threatening to tip her over with every twitch. “Arro…”
“That’s it,” Kara encourages. Dark ears swivel towards her. “You got it.”
Emboldened, Lena picks up the pace, only to trip just before reaching Kara. She lands with an audible ‘oof’, with her front paws tangled up beneath her and her back legs splooting out behind her.
“Oh!” Kara bites her tongue against a laugh, but fails when Lena growls in defeat. “I’m laughing with you, I swear.”
Lena huffs, then meows pitifully without making any effort to try again.
“Is it okay if I pick you up?” At Lena’s exhausted nod, Kara slowly and carefully scoops Lena into her cape. Fully embraced, green eyes blink tiredly up at her.
“Meh.”
The chirp is so soft Kara almost misses it. She smiles at her best friend, just barely resisting the urge to scratch under her chin. “You’re welcome.”
As the days pass, and Lena remains a cat, the injustices continue to mount. Alex feels obligated to give her a full check-up. “Full,” she repeats meaningfully.
They do it while Lena is still too exhausted to protest, but the hiss that responds to the rectal thermometer being inserted promises retribution. Then there’s the matter of feeding.
Lena’s stomach audibly growls within minutes of waking from her trauma-induced nap, but experiments in wet and dry foods all end in disaster– and one near-choking. Lena doesn’t know how to chew with cat’s teeth, and even trying to pick food out of a bowl or saucer isn’t working.
They resort to liquid protein and a plastic syringe. With no small amount of cajoling and pleading, they wrangle Lena into a towel, and then explain what needs to happen next.
“Don’t give me that look, Lena,” Kara shoots back when Lena glares at her in betrayal. “It’s not my fault you don’t know how to cat yet.”
Lena growls, low and dangerous and utterly undermined by the towel she’s swaddled in.
“I’m sure you’ll get the hang of it, but we can’t let you starve in the meantime.”
The growl doesn’t relent.
“It’s either this, or we wait until you faint with hunger and then have the vet put a tube down your nose.” Alex props a hand on her hip. “Which would you rather?”
After a long, tenuous moment, Lena squeezes her eyes shut and opens her mouth. It’s still a mess, but there’s only so much they can do to suppress the feline gag reflex. Despite her initial willingness, Lena’s soon thrashing and twisting to escape. Kara holds her gently yet firmly, murmuring comfort as Lena chokes the solution down, one mouthful at a time.
When it’s done, Lena curls up on the pile of blankets they’ve set up for on the lab table, turning her back on the room as she shivers miserably, still wheezing.
Kara watches her friend unhappily. “There has to be something we can do.”
“We’re working on it,” Alex says, but it lacks her usual confidence. “We’re trying.”
“We’ve determined that the artifact we believe resulted in Miss Luthor’s transformation is of Ophidian origin. We don’t know much about them as a species or culture, but the elemental markers of the artifact itself indicates…”
It’s not Alex’s fault she loses track of Winn’s presentation. She didn’t invite the cat to the table, after all, even though the breifing involves her directly. But the sight of a black cat sitting tall and attentive in Supergirl’s lap is distracting, no matter how much Lena’s become a fixture of the DEO over the past three weeks.
She looks more like a cat now, able to walk in straight lines and hop on and off chairs with ease. But to anyone who didn’t know the truth behind the DEO’s new unofficial mascot, they’d find something eerie about the cat that stares intently at computer screens, and seems to listen with understanding when humans talk in her presence. They’d find it especially strange to hear National City’s hero talking to an animal with the familiarity of an old friend.
Today, though, Alex stares transfixed at Lena as Kara asks Winn a question. She leans forward to gesticulate with one hand– the other remains in contact with Lena’s fur, as it typically is– and in the process a lock of her hair dangles in front of Lena’s whiskers. As Alex watches, Lena’s pupils dilate from slits to dinner plates, tracking the bobbing curl as Kara waves her hand towards the presentation screen.
Alex holds her breath as a single black paw lifts to bat at the offending lock.
“Alex?”
Lena bats at it again, this time more forcefully. As it swings back, Lena leans back onto her haunches to trap Kara’s hair between both front paws. Suddenly, the entire room falls silent at the sight of Lena Luthor gnawing on the ends of Kara’s hair.
Lena freezes when Winn inhales sharply. In an instant, she returns to her normal posture, straightbacked and solemn, but the damage is done. Kara bursts into laughter, and the others quickly follow suit. With a disdainful sniff, Lena takes her leave, hopping off Kara’s lap and stalking from the room.
Alex laughs until tears stream from her eyes, but seeing Supergirl pleading forgiveness from a spiteful cat later that evening is even better.
Trouble comes in the form of Mon-el, returned from the land of who-knows-where. Kara is so relieved to see him that she doesn’t stop to ask questions. When he asks for help returning to the planet that took him in after being banished from Earth, she immediately pledges the DEO’s aid.
The moment he steps foot in the building, Lena begins to growl. It starts low in her throat, and as it grows in volume, it lifts the fur on her back, starting with the hackles and traveling the length of her spine. When Mon-el offers a placating rub behind the ears, Lena recoils with a hiss.
“Whoa, hey,” Kara chides, scooping Lena up in her arms. Lena struggles, still growling. “This is Lena, actually.”
Mon-el’s brow furrows. “Oh-kay.”
“Lena, stop!”
Lena yowls, contorting her body to slip from Kara’s grasp. Instead of bolting, she darts towards Mon-el as soon as she’s free.
“Whoa!” he yelps, hopping back to dodge a sweep of Lena’s claws. “Hey, there!”
“All right, that’s enough,” Kara huffs. She snags Lena by the scruff and slides her into the nearest lab, shutting the door before Lena can slip back out. Lena jumps and paws at the door, howling feline obscenities.
“Sorry, she’s not usually like that.”
Mon-el brushes it off, but gives the lab a wide berth regardless.
“She’s not usually like this,” Alex echoes hours later. Lena paces restlessly in front of the door, still yowling at the top of her lungs. “She’s never been like this, Kara…”
Kara shifts uncomfortably. She doesn’t like how she handled it, but– “She was being unreasonable.” Alex gives her a pointed side-eye. “I know, I know. I’ll apologize.”
But as soon as she opens the door Lena bursts out at full speed, pausing only a moment to taste the air before charging down the hall in long bounds. “Lena!”
They follow her path down to the computer core. Kara doesn’t have a chance to wonder what Mon-el is doing there before Lena leaps onto the console with a shrieking snarl. She lashes out with a paw, raking her claws along the back of Mon-el’s hand. Kara freezes as Alex reaches for her gun.
“Stupid cat!” Mon-el snaps. He turns to face his sudden audience. “I’m bleeding!”
“We can see that,” Alex says carefully.
Kara glances to Lena, and feels nothing but shame when she takes in her friend’s arched back and flattened ears. Lena doesn’t take her eyes off her target, pupils constricting to pinpricks.
“Mon-el,” Kara says, pulling his attention to her. “Daxamites don’t bleed on Earth.”
Mon-el freezes, then glances at the back of his hand. “Damn. I forgot about that.”
Lena leaps at him with a snarl the same moment Kara and Alex launch into action. Mon-el turns neatly, smacking Lena aside before shifting into his true to meet Kara and Alex head on. The ensuing fight is brutal, but brief, and ends with a defeated Targan unconscious at their feet. Kara watches Lena slowly move towards them in the aftermath, favoring her left leg.
Their eyes meet, and guilt floods Kara. “Lena, I…”
Her apology dies on her lips as Lena turns and limps past her. When Kara looks to Alex, her sister shakes her head.
“This is on you.”
Lena’s injury heals quickly, but after that day, things change.
Lena no longer seeks Supergirl’s lap in briefings, or trots at her heels as the hero strides through the building. When not in Alex’s lab– where a corner has been devoted to Lena’s comfort– she stays with Winn, watching him work and napping in the chair he keeps open just for her. If Kara happens to travel within arm’s reach, Lena moves on, maintaining the distance between them.
Kara tries to apologize, but it’s hard when her best friend is a cat that refuses to be alone in the same room with her.
“What did you expect, Kara?” Alex has no sympathy. “You treated your best friend like a house pet.”
Kara can only shrug helplessly. “I know, but…”
“You locked her in a room because you thought she was cramping your style with the ex.” Shaking her head, Alex washes her hands of it. “I’m sorry, but you have to work it out yourself.”
“Lena! I’ve got good news!” Winn crows.
Lena stretches to her feet with a curious chirp. Winn rolls her close enough to his desk that she can plant her front paws on the console to get a closer look. He pulls up a digitized photo of the artifact they think caused her transformation.
“It turns out Lyra knows the friend of a friend of an Ophidian scholar,” he informs her. “Not a scholar who is Ophidian, but a scholar of Ophidia–”
“Meh.” Lena mews flatly, bringing back to the topic at hand.
“Right.” He taps his keyboard, and scan of an alien text appears. The text is illegible, but the illustration of their artifact is immediately recognizable. “So, the Ophidians seem to use the whole transformation thing as a right of passage. They would touch it, and it would spark the change. The thing is, the change only happened when the subject was ready– what defines ready is totally vague, by the way– and could happen at any point in the person’s life once contact was made.”
Alex joins them in the command center. “So how does this help us?”
“Well, the Ophidians are so hard to study because they were so spread out! They were travelers, and didn’t stay in one place for very long. But the artifact did. Which means that the process was designed to resolve on its own.”
Lena’s head swivels to face him, giving questioning warble.
“The effects will wear off on their own!” he translates. “No intervention required.”
“That’s great,” Alex says. She turns to face him with arms crossed. “So how much longer does the transformation last?”
Winn freezes. “Er–” Lena blinks at him, then retreats back into her chair. “They didn’t say. Apparently it’s either totally random or unique to the individual.”
Lena slips soundless to the floor, padding from the room on silent feet. Winn stares after her. “You’re welcome? Ow!” he yelps when Alex smacks the back of his head.
“You said you had good news.”
“It’ll wear off! That’s good!”
Kara finally moves from her spot on the balcony, having heard it all from afar. She finds Lena curled up in her elevated bed, curled tight with her tail over her nose. Green eyes blink dejectedly, and it breaks Kara’s heart to see the defeat in them.
“I know it’s hard to see it now,” she says softly, “but it is good news, Lena. We just have to wait it out. We’ll be right here with you, every step of the way.”
Lena blinks at her. Then she huffs, and worms herself around to face wall.
The dismissal leaves Kara feeling cold. “Right.”
“Supergirl, we have reports of a Lobo on the outskirts of the city and closing fast,” Alex relays through comms. “We have a team inbound, but they won’t make it before it hits city limits.”
Kara taps her earpiece, grateful for the distraction. “On it.”
She expects to have the Lobo trounced and back at the DEO within the hour. Instead, the Lobo trounces her. Six hours later she’s wheeled into the DEO without powers and without the Lobo. Alex plants her under the sun lamps and orders her to stay put before rolling out with the B-team.
Kara’s almost dozing when a frantic chirrup preceds a thump on the mattress beside her and the press of two paws against her ribs. Whiskers tickle her chin and neck as Lena investigates her condition, chittering anxiously all the while.
“I’m okay,” Kara murmurs, cracking open one eyelid. “Promise.”
Lena sighs, and Kara can almost imagine it’s relief.
“I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you, Lena. Really, I am.”
After a moment, a furry head butts against her chin affectionately. Forgiven, Kara heaves a sigh of her own as Lena curls up on her shoulder, purring loudly. After a moment, Kara grins. “You’re just here for the sunlamps, aren’t you?”
Lena’s tail whips her sharply in the nose, making Kara laugh.
When Alex checks on them later, Kara’s fallen asleep with one hand buried in Lena’s fur. Lena doesn’t even open an eye.
Kara wakes to a heavy weight pressed against her side. She remembers the Lobo and curses, before opening her eyes to find a very human, very naked Lena curled up beside her. In a blink, Kara flips her cape across both of them, protecting Lena’s modesty.
Lena doesn’t stir.
“Lena?” Kara wiggles her shoulder, jostling Lena’s sleeping head. “Lena…”
When that fails, she resorts to clicking her tongue enticingly, which had the habit of making Lena’s ears twitch even in sleep.
“I’m going to kill you in your sleep,” Lena mutters hoarsely. Only then do her eyes fly open. She registers her condition first, her undress second, and Kara’s grin third. “Hey…”
“Hey, there.”
“Umm…”
“It’s a shame you didn’t wait until your birthday,” Kara teases. “Now I have a whole bunch of catnip to give away.”
Lena snorts. The heavy return of her head to Kara’s shoulder hints that the transformation back has taken its toll.
“I really am sorry,” Kara says softly.
“Grab me by the scruff again and I’ll claw your eyes out.” But then Lena softens. “I’m glad you’re okay.”
“Me too.”
“Can we go home? I miss my bed.”
Kara grins at Lena’s unhappy groan, which sounds remarkably like a feline grumble. “Sure. But I’m pretty sure the scratching post is DEO property.”
“I hate you.”
