#supercorp softness

Hello hello!

This is my contribution to the @supercorpzine this year! It was such a joy to be part of such a great project and collaborate (sort of) with such great, funny, talented people.

(holy crap how long has this ask been here I'm so sorry)

For @vox-ex, a probably VERY delayed response!

“I really don’t understand how you get yourself into these situations,’’ Lena mutters around the knife clasped in her teeth as she uses both hands to tug at the waterlogged netting. Satisfied that it’s far enough away from Kara’s skin, she begins hacking at it.

“What was I supposed to do, just let them fish there?” Kara asks, standing semi-meekly in a puddle of seawater on Lena's italian marble floor.

Lena grunts as she manages to saw through one of the ropes. “No, just… how?"

Kara flushes crimson. “I was dropping off a friend.”

“A friend,” Lena repeats flatly. “In the middle of the Pacific?”

“Yes.”

“Did this friend have gills, perchance?”

“... maybe.”

“Kara,” Lena laughs, shaking her head. “We’ve talked about this.”

“I know, but I just… she needed help. And the DEO-”

“-isn’t what you thought,” Lena murmurs, eyes sympathetic. “I know.”

“Anyways, I was like, so close, too- I’d already gotten her where she needed to be, and I was on my way back-, then I heard a dolphin, and it was clearly hurting, so I went down, and he was tangled in a bunch of netting- illegal netting! And it wasn’t just him, a few other dolphins were too.”

Lena’s eyes flash. “Did you see the boats? What company they worked for?”

“Oh, I saw the boats,” Kara grumbles. “My friend Arthur took care of them, though.”

“Arthur…?”

“Oh! Um… Aquaman?”

Lena snorts. “Jesus. Of course, why would you not know Aquaman?” At Kara’s pout, she continues her careful sawing. “Alright, sorry, continue.”

“Anyways, I’d already been up for a long time, and I was like, really pushing my powers to the limit on that trip out there. And then there were all the dolphins, and I was holding my breath a bunch and having to swim pretty deep- by the way, it like, royally sucks, being that deep underwater. There is no light, at all. And it sounds weird, and it’s-” She cuts off, shuddering slightly. “I dunno. The ocean is beautiful and amazing and must be protected, but it freaks me the heck out."

"That's fair, it's not my favorite either. So, the net?"

"Right! So turns out, I like, sapped my powers doing all the ocean rescuing, and I got my foot caught and I struggled a bunch and sorta kinda almost drowned…"

"Kara!" Lena yells, slapping at Kara's legs through the netting.

"Hey, I am weak right now, woman! That means no hitting!"

"Sorry, I'll hit you when you feel better."

"... thanks, I guess? Anyways, obviously I'm fine, Ar-Aquaman saved me. Even brought me back here! He's a nice dude."

"If your friend rescued you and dropped you off, why are you still wrapped up in a fishing net?"

"..."

"Kara?"

"Okay, so he's not that nice: he said he thought it'd be funny."

Lena snorts, grinning victoriously as she finally cuts the last bit of the net free, moving to her feet just in time to catch Kara as she staggers forward. "Hey there, Supergirl, take it easy."

"'m tired," Kara murmurs, soaked to the bone and shivering in Lena's firm embrace. "And cold."

Lena tucks a lank lock of hair behind her ear and presses a kiss to her forehead. "Okay. How about the world's hottest bath to warm up and scrub the ocean off of you, and then bed?"

Kara hums in agreement, stumbling a bit as Lena half-carries her off to the en suite, leaving the very heavy fishing net on the kitchen floor to worry about later.

Lena starts the hot water running in her ridiculous, amazing pool/tub before they work together to strip Kara out of her suit (and with as clingy as the material is when it's not soaking wet, that's no mean feat). Finally free of her suit, Kara trips her way into the tub, and when Lena moves to pick up the shopping wet cape, she pouts and makes grabby hands at her. "Please?"

Lena shakes her head, chuckling at her utter inability to say no to Kara ever, before stripping out of her own clothes and lowering herself into the scalding hot water.

"Mmmm," Kara hums happily, wrapping Lena up with arms and legs. "Much better."

"I'm gonna boil alive in here," Lena laughs, dropping her head back onto Kara's shoulder. "This is how I die- turned into soup in my own bathtub."

Kara giggles, nosing at Lena's neck. "My favorite soup." Lena can feel the smile that spreads across Kara's face. "Makes sense, since you're already my favorite thing to ea-"

"No," Lena says firmly (though it's undercut by her smile), clapping a wet hand over Kara's mouth and sloshing some water over the side of the tub. Kara's eyes are squinty and twinkly as Lena feels a trail of wet heat across her palm. She recoils on instinct. "Did you just lick me?"

Kara shrugs with a devilish smile. "You usually respond better when I lick you."

"Oh god," Lena laughs. "You know, I got in here to help you feel better but I think all you wanted was to make terrible sex jokes."

"And for you to be naked," Kara corrects. "That part was very important to me, and it is definitely making me feel better."

"You're a scoundrel," Lena tells her, dropping a quick kiss to her lips before settling down again. 

"I know. Don't tell anyone else, though. I have an image to maintain."

"Noted."

It's quiet for a bit as they just take break, soaking (or boiling) and enjoying each other's company before finally, Lena speaks. 

"I can't believe Aquaman's real name is Arthur," she mutters. "Just... what a nerdy name."

(For @nieladasdenani )

Okay, so look.

Kara’s not, like, a prude when it comes to alcohol. She’s down for sneaking a nip of Alex’s whiskey, if only to laugh at her sister’s indignant squawking when she spots Kara’s plunder. She’s cool to drink ridiculous, fruity nonsense with Nia, and to crack open a beer with Clark after choring (read: heckling him from the porch with Lois) on the farm. She’s especially fond of wine with Lena, the way her eyes get brighter and her laughs louder and her lips wine-stained and irresistible- not that Kara is really all that resistant to those lips, anyway…

So yeah, Kara’s no teetotaler. She can handle her alcohol, no problem.

Obviously.

Alien booze, however… she doesn’t have a ton of experience with that. She’s only ever really tried it the one time, and Mon-El had given her the strongest possible shot (like an asshole), and the resulting awful hangover had kinda soured her to the whole thing.

But Lucy is in town for the night, and she’s managed to smuggle not only herself and Vasquez but a bottle of alien booze out of the desert base, and she’s so proud of herself for it that Kara knows that the gig is up before it’s even cracked open.

Lena’s stuck at work, because… something. Kara didn’t- she was paying attention, okay? It’s just that none of the words sounded like real words. But the gist of it was that Lena’s not coming. Which is cool, she’s busy and important and she’s always trying so hard to be everywhere for everyone else that Kara doesn’t have it in her to be upset. Even when it’s, like, super lame.

Ha! Super lame!

“What was that, Kara?” Lucy asks with a devilish grin.

“Nothing. I’m just funny,” Kara informs her, taking another (less than) dainty sip of her drink.

“But are you funny on purpose?” Alex muses.

“Everything I do is on purpose,” Kara sniffs, promptly spilling her drink across the table. A bit fuzzy, but still clear enough to feel the weight of stifled giggles and knowing smirks, Kara rights her empty glass and nods. “See? I was finished with that.”

“Oh my god, she’s wasted,” Nia cackles, delighted.

“I am not!” Kara shouts, instantly shushed by her giggling friends. “I am soberly perfect.” Kara’s brow crinkles, and her head tips to the side. “Oh, wait, no…”

“Oh, honey,” Alex coos at her, pulling Kara snug against her side. Kara briefly considers shrugging her off, but being cuddled is like, her favorite thing in the world, so she decides to roll with it. “Where’s your wife?”

Kara huffs loudly. “She’s not my wife.”

“Not yet,” Lucy says. “What is it, three more weeks?”

“Four,” Kara corrects with what is definitely not her ‘dopey Lena smile’, shut up, Alex. “That’s why she’s stuck at work, I think. Doesn’t wanna worry about stuff before the wedding. Except for, like, the wedding. Hey, d’you think I could get her to do the Cupid Shuffle with me?”

“Only if it’s horizontal,” Lucy says seriously. Kara nods thoughtfully at this.

Alex snorts wine out her nose.

The night continues, the drinks keep flowing, and now they’re all laughing and no one seems to really know why, exactly, but they also can’t stop.

Kara’s butt is vibrating, currently, which is at least a small part of why she’s laughing, because it tickles and oh. Oh! It’s her phone! She fishes it out with no small degree of difficulty.

“Kara’s pants! How may I direct your call?” she chirps.

There’s a soft laugh in her ear. “Hey, love. Are you having fun?”

“Lena! We’re having the most fun of anyone! Alex spat wine everywhere, and Nia might be- yup, she’s asleep. Nia! But yes! Hi! Hello! How is your work going?”

Lena snorts. “It was fine, I’m done now, just about to get in the car and head home.”

“Yaaaaaaay!”

“Have you been drinking a little?”

“Nope! I’ve been drinking a lot,” Kara says with a grin.

“Do you want me to come pick you up on my way?”

Kara positively beams. “Heck yeah, please! Vasquez left, and Nia is asleep and Lucy said something about ‘paratrooping’ that made Alex all red and spit more wine…”

Another snort. “Alright, I’m on my way. You’re at Alex’s, right?”

“Yup! Oh hey! I didn’t tell you the best part!”

“What’s that?”

“I get to see you!”

There’s a huff of what Kara knows after several years to be fondness. Or exasperation. Really they’re one and the same, in her experience. “Oh, lord. You’re a flirty drunk, aren’t you?”

“I have no idea! Am I? And is it working, because I would not mind seeing a boob this evening. Would probably really make this night a ten out of ten, for me. Because boobs are great. ‘specially your  boobs. Like, wow.”

“Gross, Kara!” Alex yells, shoving Kara sideways so she flops off of her sister and onto the floor.

“Ow.” Kara turns on her best puppy eyes, though they’re wasted on the non-video call. “Alex hit me.”

“I’m sure she’s sorry.”

Kara hums suspiciously before whisper-shouting, “Are you sorry you hit me?”

“Nope!” Alex says, swatting her on the butt.

“She’s not sorry at all!” Kara gasps. “She hit my butt, and I did not like it! Why do you like that?”

There’s dead silence on all sides before Lucy rolls her head enough to give Alex a shit-eating grin. “You owe me $50.”

“My ears!” Alex wails, immediately grabbing the nearest bottle and upending it into her mouth in the quest for amnesia.

“Okay, so… that just happened. I’m gonna come up to get you, and then we’re gonna go home and I’m gonna not see your sister for a few days. Okay?”

“Okay! She’s mean, anyways.”

“Yes she is.”

***

Lena knew what she was walking into. She’s dealt with drunk people before- she’s been a drunk person, probably with far more regularity than is entirely healthy. She’s handled drunk girlfriends, even.

However.

Drunk Kara is another matter entirely.

“Baby!”

This is Lena’s only warning before her arms are fully of a warm, wiggly, very drunk Kryptonian. Lena manages to catch Kara and herself, barely, only stuttering half a step backward at the impact. “Hi there.”

Kara snuggles deeply into her embrace, pressing her face to Lena’s neck and breathing deeply. “Y’smell so nice. How d’you always smell nice?”

Lena coughs, fighting the good fight against the flush creeping up her neck. She ducks her head to the side, smiling sheepishly and giving the still-conscious occupants of the room a wave. “Hello.”

Lucy offers her a lazy half-wave and Alex glares while Nia snores away. “Hey hey, Luthor. Gonna take her home?”

“Well I’m not flyin’, that’s for sure,” Kara laughs, and Lena suppresses the urge to shudder as Kara’s hot breath puffs against her neck.

“Can’t have Supergirl knocking a jetliner out of the sky,” Lena says with a smile. “That’s a lot of paperwork for you.”

Lucy waves that away with a slow grin. “Nah, I’d just make Alex do it.”

Alex, without looking over or breaking the seal of her lips on the bottle, stretches her leg out, plants her foot firmly to Lucy’s side, and shoves hard, sending Lucy flying.

And with Kara now mouthing wetly at her neck and murmuring things in Kryptonian that she’s extremely glad only she can hear, Lena gives them a parting wave and starts to struggle her way down the hall with Kara’s weight heavy against her side.

“How are you so heavy?” she groans playfully, shifting a bit so Kara’s arm is thrown over her shoulder and hers is wrapped snugly around Kara's waist.

Kara pouts at her, the new position preventing her from being able to reach Lena’s neck with her mouth. “You saying I’m fat?”

“I don’t think anyone on Earth could call you fat. You are shockingly heavy for being as thin as you are, though. I wonder if your bone or muscle structure is denser than ours? Or if it’s a result of Earth’s gravity…”

Kara’s pout deepens. “Sounds like you’re calling me fat with science.”

Lena huffs at her affectionately. “Don’t be a brat. Did you have fun?”

Kara’s face lights up. “We had so much fun! We played games, and Nia learned why she shouldn’t play shot poker with Lucy and Alex, and it turns out that Lucy mixes really good drinks with the stuff I drink- d’you think she practiced? I bet she practiced. We should go ask!” Kara turns on her heel, only stopped when she feels Lena tug her backward by a belt loop. She tips her head back until she can see her upside-down girlfriend- nope! Wait! Fiancee! “No?”

“No. Not unless you want to learn what paratrooping is,” Lena chuckles.

Kara’s nose wrinkled. “I prob’ly don’t.”

“Probably not.”

“Can we get balloons? I just- I really think I need to get a balloon, y’know? You ever just really need to have a balloon?”

Lena grins. “I can’t say that I have, but sure. We can stop and get you a balloon.”

“You’re the best fiancée anywhere, ever. And I’d know, ‘cause like, I’ve been to other anywheres and other evers. And yeah, you definitely win the fiancée contest. By a mile. Because nobody else got their fiancée balloons.”

“Deeply impressed that you managed to say fiancée correctly three times when you can’t walk straight.”

“That’s ‘cause it’s fun to say! And fun to think! We’re almost married! That’s nuts! Who said we were allowed?”

Lena pops onto her tiptoes to plant a sound kiss to Kara’s flushed cheek. “We did, I think.”

“Oh, yeah, right. We’re so smart, for doing that. ‘Cause now you’re my fiancée. Which is fun to say. Know what else is fun to say? Balloon. Balloon, balloon, balloon. Y’ever do that thing, where you say a word so many times that it doesn’t even sound like a real word anymore?”

“Synergy. Margins. Quarterly…” Lena laughs as they finally, mercifully reach the elevator. “Pretty much any time I have a board meeting, at least one word sounds made up by the end.”

“That makes sense. Hey! I bet I can be a balloon!”

“What do you- Kara!”

Kara grins down at her, hovering a foot or so off the ground. “This is fun!”

“Kara, you can’t be a balloon right now, what if someone sees you?”

“They’ll think they’re drunk.”

“That only works when they are drunk. Right now the only drunk one is you.”

“’m not drunk, you’re just blurry,” Kara giggles. “Cute blurry.”

Lena hooks her finger through Kara’s belt loop again when she starts to float too high, relieved when it brings her closer. “Can you be a balloon closer to the ground?”

“I dunno, ‘m just a balloon, Lena, duh.”

Lena snorts, tugging her into the elevator when it arrives, resigned to her fate. “You’re a very talkative balloon.”

“Am I being a bad balloon? You gonna pop me?”

Lena raises an eyebrow. “Is this… supposed to be a euphemism?”

“What’s a euphonium?”

“Right, not a euphemism, got it.”

Kara blinks at her, eyes too-bright in that way they get sometimes when she’s overtired (or, apparently, drunk). “Am I annoying you?”

“No more so than usual,” Lena grins. At Kara’s crestfallen look, she pulls her close until she can wrap her in a proper hug. “You’re not being annoying, love, just funny. And I’m really happy that you had such a good time with your friends, especially since I feel so bad about bailing on you last minute. I’ll carry you home any day of the week, Kara Danvers, because I love you.”

“Even when I’m bein’ a balloon?”

“Nobody I’d rather have on the end of my string,” Lena confirms, thumb tracing over the braided metal band of Kara's betrothal bracelet.

Kara nods with a big, goofy smile, pressing a kiss to Lena’s mouth that tastes… not quite like anything Lena’s ever tasted before. Something sweet and sticky and not exactly unpleasant. “Awesome. Love you too. Can we still go get a balloon?”

Lena laughs loud and bright in the tiny, snail’s pace elevator. “We can get you a dozen balloons.”

(Kara remembers none of this the next morning, and emerges from their bedroom squinting and questioning the large bouquet of balloons emblazoned with messages ranging from 'It's a Boy!' to 'Get Well Soon!'.

I had written some one-shots a little ways back on AO3 and this one felt like a pretty good follow-up to the angsty prompt fill I did for  @butimaloneandfree yesterday so I decided to just tweak it a little bit and post it here too as a kind of happy ending.

—– —–

Kara and Lena discover the beauty of their scars and learn that sometimes a simple touch is enough.

—– —–

Kara wakes to the warmth of sunlight and the weight of Lena’s arms around her as they lie tangled together in the pale morning haze that leaks through the window. It’s a feeling that is still so new that she still finds herself trying to memorizing the details of it. Because for so long she had wanted to let herself be held by Lena this way and she knows how easily she could have never have known it at all — is reminded how easily she could never feel it again.

She grounds herself in the rhythmic motion of Lena’s breathing, her chest rising and falling against her back. She lets herself relax into the feeling, into the gentle touch of fingers tracing along her side and around the margins of the skin still healing there.

She can still feel the heat of the explosion, still smell the sulfur in the air as she wrapped her body around Lena’s.

She remembers the distant sound of her sister’s voice as she looked up at the embers that fell against the darkened sky. Remembers the feeling of hands, the desperate pressure, and distant pain as they worked to stop the blood that flowed from her side.

She looks at Lena’s hands now, held against her skin with a different kind of desperation, no longer trembling, no longer stained with blood.

She had long since memorized the feeling of Lena’s touch, but it was different like this, the barrier of her imperviousness gone. She could feel the calloused skin of her fingers, could feel the warmth left behind as they moved back and forth. She wondered what Lena felt when she held her like this. If it felt as safe, as comforting. Because her own hands had always felt clumsy and awkward, restrained by their need to be careful, but she hoped they were capable of making Lena feel this loved.

Kara shifts slightly, her body finally protesting her stillness as it tries to alleviate the pain of broken ribs and weakened muscles. She carefully turns in Lena’s arms and lies on her back; blue eyes meeting green in the growing light for the first time, and she lets out a deep breath as Lena settles against her once more, her head resting on her chest and her hands warm on her skin where her shirt had ridden up.

They stayed like that, silence persisting as they held each other until Lena’s voice breaks them both from their reverie.

“It won’t scar.”

Kara looks down to where Lena’s fingers had stilled over the carefully stitched wound on her rib cage, the feeling there still dulled in a way the rest of her body wasn’t.

But there isn’t any sense of awe in Lena’s words, no doubt, just quiet contemplation.

“No, it won’t.”

Kara thinks of the scar on her forehead, the only physical reminder she has of the past she left behind and the home she had lost. She thinks how her body bears no other proof of her pain. Thinks how it will not let her remember this pain either.

“But sometimes I wish it would. Sometimes I wish I could look at my body and see the reminder of how strong it is, how much it has endured, what it is capable of surviving. Because some days it is too easy to forget.”

She lets her fingers trail along the set of scars on Lena’s shoulder, the remnants of another close call, another explosion that had littered her skin with shrapnel and left her with the permanent reminder of her Brother’s betrayal.

Up close like this, it was impossible to see Lena as the rest of the world did — cold, hard, unbreakable. And a part of Kara wished that they could see her like she does, but Lena did not owe the world her pain. It did not deserve it.

“Is that what you see when you look at me?”

Lena’s words are hesitant and quiet, muffled by the fabric of Kara’s shirt.

She sits up slightly cupping Lena’s face gently, her chin lifting so their eyes meet again, and then she takes one of her hands in her own.

“I look at you and I see all the things you’ve fought for.”

She lets her thumb run over her knuckles, the fractures long since healed, but the reminder of them still there.

“I see all the things you’ve fought against.”

Kara pushes Lena’s hair away from her face revealing the small scar above her eyebrow.

“And I see all the ways you are even more beautiful for having survived.”

She turns Lena’s palm over, and she places a kiss over skin that will soon bare a scar of its own.

“But mostly I see them and I feel thankful. Thankful that you are here, that you are strong enough for the things I can’t protect you from, that you are strong enough to love me.”

And then like every other touch that she had let prove the evidence of her words, Kara places a hand over Lena’s heart, closing her eyes to imagine the familiar sound of the pattern she felt underneath.

It’s then that Lena’s bandaged hand moves up to trace the angle of her jaw, thumb wiping away tears she hadn’t even been aware of. She leans into Lena’s touch in awe again of how different it feels, how the feeling is all at once so familiar and so new.

Kara lets Lena guide her back onto the bed, the blankets pushed down around them so that there is nothing left between them, and when they finally come together, the kiss is so full of need and want and promise that it leaves its own kind of scar. And in that moment, Kara tries to memorize the feeling of her heart beating underneath Lena’s hands. Because her heart is the only part of her that is capable of scarring, the only part of her that reminds her she is strong enough. Strong enough to lose everything, strong enough to love despite of it, strong enough to risk losing even more.

There will still be days when she worries about forgetting her strength.

Days she has to carry the hidden burden of surviving.

But today she doesn’t have to bear the weight of feeling nothing.

Today she can be vulnerable and broken and imperfect and be reminded that there is comfort in the pain of living and beauty in the cost of surviving.