Nobody Does It Better

Meanwhile, at the DEO...

Some people in the world hated the night-shift. Alex Danvers was not one of them. She'd always been a night-owl, long before she joined the DEO; and although the... activities she'd involved herself in during those times were long behind her, the joy at being able to live her life while the rest of the world was asleep remained.

Now, instead of the bright lights and the earth-shakingly loud music, there was quiet. Peace. Serenity. She'd could get things done. Catch up on all her paperwork. Read all those articles she needed to read, but never had the time for. And... she could indulge.

Maggie was, stricly speaking, a vegetarian, but ate vegan whenever she could; which meant, involuntarily, that Alex was now a vegetarian that ate vegan whenever Maggie could. Worse, Maggie had gone on a health-food kick over the past few weeks, and 90% of all their meals now featured either quinoa or kale, most of them both. Maggie had said that she'd been eating too much bad food on the job, and that she needed to keep up with 'DEO conditioning', as she'd put it. Alex suspected that Maggie was freaking out about the wedding already, but wisely considered it... ungentlewomanly to say this out loud.

And so, as partners of vegetarians who hadn't signed on had done since time began, Alex took full advantage of the meals they didn't share.

Sometimes, she would go out. She'd take an hour, and stroll around as the clubs emptied out; watching the girls she used to be stumble and laugh and make out with guys - helping them out, when she thought they were in trouble - and she'd get herself something. Sometimes, it was the bacon-blue cheese burger from the diner down on Crescent, dripping with unholy, delicious pork and dairy fats; sometimes, it was the currywurst from the van parked on Seventh - a simple, cheap German sausage, covered in generic ketchup and curry powder, with a roll - that tasted exactly like it sounded; once, she'd gone to an Andoorian sushi bar, and while the flavour of raw tuna surrounded by... she'd guessed sauerkraut, but it was best not to ask - was an acquired taste, she'd be willing to try it again.

But, in the depths of her soul, she knew that her heart - and her tastebuds - truly belonged to the understated, unassuming, delightful nastiness of the DEO kitchen vending machines. And tonight, they had provided her with a magnificent bounty: a can of full-sugar Sprite; a bag of potato chips, refrigerated to the absolute perfect temperature, in a world where no-one would even think to refrigerate them at all; not one, but TWO sandwiches - one ham and cheese, the other a more tantalisingly ambiguous 'meat'; and - in a sign that she was truly favoured by the snack food gods - a single serving pack of Chocos, which the DEO bought by the crate, but were somehow rarer than gold dust.

It amused her that, at some point, someone was going to have to sit in down in front of a Senate Intelligence sub-commitee and explain that, no, the DEO's Choco budget was not a surreptitious line-item to hide funding for a secret death ray; but was, in fact, merely an unusually high expenditure on an otherwise inexpensive delicious chocolate treat.

It amused her even more that it wouldn't have to be her.

"Mine!" Alex barked clumsily, muffled from the bite of sandwich she was still chewing, and slammed her hand down over the Chocos on the desk without looking - before the larger hand, which now covered her own, could take them from her.

She turned her head, and there stood J'onn J'onzz - Last Son of Mars, Director of the DEO, and the main culprit behind the agency's problem with vast Choco inequality - waiting for her to be the first one to break. Realising that she wouldn't, his face turned to pure innocence, he held up his hands in surrender, and said, "I was just going to open them for you."

"Uh huh," she hummed, and sipped her Sprite - which was far emptier than she thought it was; and so produced a brief gargle and the sound of an empty vacuum, instead of the victorious slurp she'd been hoping for - before picking up her rightly-earned cookies and moving them to the opposite side of the desk from where J'onn stood.

"You're in early," she said, smugly, taking her feet off the desk.

"Couldn't sleep," J'onn said, a tinge of apprehension in his voice.

"It's goin' around," she said, "Anything I can help with?"

"Not sure," he said, "Has anything... unusual happened tonight?"

"Not that I'm aware of. It's been quiet," she replied.

"No psychic activity?"

"I wouldn't know," she reminded him, adding, "You sure it wasn't just a bad dream?"

J'onn pondered this, and finally said, sadly, "Perhaps."

Alex knew enough to know when to ask questions... and when not to.

"Well, Winn's here, so I can get him to look into it, if you want. I'm sure he'd welcome-"

"No, he's not," J'onn said, suddenly.

The statement set off a feeling in Alex like hearing a siren in the distance; there was an emergency somewhere, you just didn't know where it was yet. It was disconcerting enough to bring her to her feet.

"What d'you mean?" she asked.

"He isn't here, Agent Danvers," J'onn repeated, authoritatively.

"But I just saw him! It was like," she paused, checking her watch, "maybe forty-five minutes ago?"

"I believe you, Alex; but if Agent Schott were in the building, I would know it," J'onn said; before adding - in a tone of voice that suggested that there were Things Martian Was Not Meant To Know; but had, by psychic osmosis, become privy to them anyway - "He has a very distinctive thought pattern."

"Well, he wouldn't have just left in that time. Where would he go?" Alex asked, right before a brief fanfare sounded over the PA, and the main screen in Central Ops - and virtually every other screen in the room - switched to a title card that read 'IMPORTANT MESSAGE'.

Alex's eyes widened. The sirens in her head were getting closer...

The title card disappeared, and was replaced by a distressing close-up of an ear; before the person it belonged to became satisfied the camera was on, and sat back to reveal themselves to be Agent Winslow Schott, Jr, dressed in his tactical gear.

"Hi, Guys!" Video Winn said, nervously.

"Oh, no," Alex said, quietly, to no-one in particular.

"Yeah," Big-screen Winn said, as though answering her, "So, if you're watching this, it's because thirty-five minutes ago, me - and my glamourous assistant-"

Alex - and the entire night staff of the DEO - watched as Winn slid his chair out of view to reveal LENA FREAK'N LUTHOR - who was, from her body language, not at all expecting to be on camera - standing far behind him, also dressed in tactical gear; before sliding back into position to continue:

"We took an unauthorised trip to Maaldoria, and are now thirty minutes overdue; so, we've possibly been captured, or maybe even killed. Now Alex, I know what you're thinking, how could I be so stupid-"

- it was, at best, the edited-for-TV-and-airlines version of what she was thinking -

"-and it's a fair question; but, to be honest, I don't think we have that kind of time. Now the portal's all set up to go, you just need to press the big red button on THIS tablet-" Winn held up a tablet; showing a gold eye with a neon-blue iris in the centre, and a teardrop forming at the bottom on its case, "-and it'll bring you here; so if you could just get passed the whole thing where you want to kill me, and come get us..." he trailed off, then forced himself into fake cheerfulness, "that'd be great. Hope to hear from you soon."

There was an awkward silence, and then, "Thanks."

Winn reached up to shut off the camera, and the screens all turned back to how they had been before.

Alex stood there, having stepped off the edge of the world. Winn - WINN - had broken a civilian - and not just any civilian, but a bona fide security risk - into the DEO, taken her to see a piece of top secret alien technology, and then onto an incredibly dangerous alien planet, right under everyone's nose. Right under her nose.

He'd lied, right to her face, and she didn't even know it.

She'd have been proud of him, if it didn't make her trigger finger itch.

"Agent Danvers," J'onn began - in the same tone he would use three months from now against the junior Senator from Ohio at the suggestion that the DEO procure a cheaper, more generic cookie - "Please put a team together and get Agent Schott and Lena Luthor back from Slaver's Moon. Unharmed."

"Do I have to?" she asked.

J'onn hesitated just a little longer than he ought to have, then said, "We can't let a high-profile civilian like Lena Luthor die on an alien planet."

Alex sighed, then turned to the rest of the DEO, all of whom were now staring at the two of them, and said, "Come on, people, you heard the-" she pointed up at the main screen, loathing to use the word, "-'man', let's go get them back. Charlie, Dana, you're with me."

Alex matched away, and J'onn waited a moment, before slowly sidling over to the other side of the desk, where the pack of Chocos sat waiting for him...

"MINE!" Alex yelled as she ran back, snatching her Chocos from under him before rejoining her team, and heading back towards Winn's lab.