Home is Together (A Supercorp Story)

Chapter Ten

Kara noticed Lena inhale sharply when she saw a chess board lying on the bed. Lena ran her fingers across the square boxes as she remembered her childhood. Lex had taught her how to play the game when they were kids and she had loved it ever since. She admired the strategic aspect of it and how she could compare all of the chess pieces to a part of the world and to her life. She pulled away suddenly and stood up as if she was ashamed that she had ever bonded with her brother more than a decade ago.

Kara turned around before Lena could notice she was staring at her. She rummaged through everything Lex had left behind but she steered clear of the chess board and so did Alex. She must've seen Kara look at Lena and Kara blushed at the thought.

She cleared her throat. "These are just standard prison things. And a couple of journals that just explain how to kill Superman."

There were at least five of those journals and it made Kara's blood boil when she skimmed through it. They had spent hours reading through all of them but it didn't include any information they needed. Kara had read about Lena's childhood but she didn't say anything. She was disturbed by the fact that Lex and Lillian had used Lena so many times even before she reached the age of ten. Lex wrote so many belittling things about her that Kara felt the urge to just pull her into a hug and never let go. The things Lex wrote about killing her cousin couldn't even compare to what Lex had described about what Lena had to endure as a child.

Lena suddenly looked up from one of the leather journals and slammed it shut. "The chess board." She walked over to it, fingering the pieces as if she was trying to decide which one to pick.

Lena muttered a string of words to herself and rearranged the chess pieces into a familiar pattern. The board split in the middle with a small creak and a button appeared on the edge of the left half.

She pushed it before Alex and Kara could warn her. They all looked up when the grey wall to their right groaned open. There was a tense silence when they realized it was a secret passageway.

Lena walked in without hesitation and Kara and Alex followed. Kara was silently in awe of how she had figured it out. She never really saw Lena in action outside of her lab.

"That was impressive." Kara smiled at Lena.

"Yeah, how'd you figure it out?" Alex wondered.

"Lex taught me how to play chess when I was five and he drilled everything he knew about it into my head by the time I was nine." She explained. "I just remembered this specific pattern when he wrote about playing chess with me in one of his journals. He mentioned it a lot growing up."

Kara was about to mention what she read in the journals she had but decided against it. Alex was Lena's friend but it wouldn't be right to discuss something like that in front of her.

"I think Lex wanted me to find this place." Lena's voice trailed off as she ran her hand along the wall.

"Why would he?" Alex asked.

Lena shook her head. "I don't know. Maybe he wanted to mock how long it took me to find him and laugh in my face when he defeats me again."

Kara frowned at Lena's sad expression. She couldn't wait to find Lex and bring him down. The bastard would deserve everything he had coming.

They had passed several empty rooms in the long, secret hallway but Lena paused when she peered into one located in the middle of the hall. Kara, curious, wanted to see what made Lena turn a slight tint of red. She walked up behind Lena and pressed her body against hers but she shifted slightly so that she could see into the room.

Lena's heart sped up when she felt Kara push her body into her backside and her cheeks grew even hotter. The walls of the room were covered with photos of Kara and everyone she was associated with. Half of the photos were of her and Kara together.

Alex appeared next to them, trying to ignore what was happening next to her. "Red Daughter's room." She awkwardly pointed to a Russian-English dictionary on the bed.

Kara stepped back and heard Lena release a breath.

"How could she have lived here?" Kara asked. "Actually, how was she even here? This is a secure prison."

"There must be another secret entrance somewhere." Lena said, her voice more high pitched than usual.

She noticed Alex give her a weird look but she ignored it and motioned at the end of the hall. It was dark but it was very clearly a dead end.

"She had to have gotten in here somehow so there must be a door that leads to somewhere else." Lena continued. "That other entrance is important. It might tell us something."

Kara agreed. "Let me use my x-ray vision."

Immediately, she yelped in pain. How none of them noticed that the room was coated with lead was beyond her but she was more disappointed that there was no way for them to find the secret door.

"It's fine. Red Daughter is gone anyway. There's nothing telling us that anyone else was here besides her and Lex." Alex reassured her sister.

She was right. In every room that they passed and peeked into, none of them contained anything but a simple bed. None of the beds had any sheets or bedding.

The three of them kept walking, peering into each room on the way even though they knew they wouldn't find anything useful. Lena was the first one who got to the end of the hallway and reached out to touch the wall. She felt chalk.

"Anyone have any light?" She asked, her tone was intriguing.

Alex held up her phone light towards the wall. They could make out a drawing that was etched on the wall. It was slightly faded and Lena had a bad feeling that Lex had been planning something really bad for a really long time.

Alex stepped closer to the wall to shine more light on it. She could tell it was a drawing of a mountain and the details were so perfectly drawn on that she became interested in something Lex had done for the first time.

Kara saw the color drain from Lena's face when she took in every detail. Kara noticed why when she realized Lex had included moments from their childhood that she had read about earlier. The chessboard and the fallen king was on the bottom left corner of the wall. A few inches to the right was a sketch of two figures competing at a fencing competition. He made it clear that the winning one was Lena and Kara couldn't help but feel a sense of pride. Their treehouse that Lena had told her about was a little higher up, closer to the center. He drew a young girl holding on to a teddy bear that was nearly as big as her torso. Lillian was behind the little girl with a wicked smile plastered on her face.

Kara watched as Lena traced her finger over every little sketch. She paused at a big drawing of when Lex had taken her and tied her to an office chair at his old Luthorcorp office, which was her current one, a few years ago. She hadn't moved to National City yet but she had been in town to visit her brother. She remembered that day like it was yesterday and she remembered how Lex had laughed and screamed in her face about how pathetic she was. He had never been so cruel to her before and she remembered she had broken down, tears streaming down her face, but he had done nothing but smile at her coldly.

She took her finger off the wall as if it suddenly burned and she sniffled, holding back her tears. She gave the drawing a small smile when she remembered that he had gotten thrown into jail when the authorities arrived later on.

"Lena?" Kara's voice was full of concern.

Lena wanted to sink into her arms when she heard how soft Kara's voice was.

"I'm okay." Lena glanced at her for a second before focusing on the wall in front of her again. "This entire thing is definitely a clue."

Kara noticed Alex's dark expression in the little light they had. She had noticed how harsh Lena's childhood was, too, and she didn't seem to like it.

"I know where he is." Lena said suddenly.

Alex and Kara turned to look at her and they followed her gaze to the very top of the drawing. The top of the mountain.

"I know where he is." She repeated.