In which a Queen Administrator hosted in a small human body is brought to a world that already has an older, alternate and adult Queen Administrator gradually recovering from the loss of Taylor during the Gold Morning. One is very fond of creating biological, robotic, and biomechanical abominations Friends while the other is the most powerful psychic on that Earth. Despite their differing backgrounds and current specialties, they're both highly competent and know exactly what they're doing; confusion definitely will not ensue. Definitely.
AN: This was originally posted in my snippet thread and the AdMis thread. Hopefully, prior setting knowledge will not be required, and the story may contain Supergirl and/or Administrative Mishap spoilers because of it. Prior knowledge will at least help, though.
Queen Administrator was uncomfortable. She had grown used to some mild discomfort since her unusual connection to Taylor Hebert and the resulting role substitution; the diagnostic systems on human bodies were exceptionally primitive, and their alert systems were often unpleasant. However, there was mild discomfort, and then there was laying atop concrete instead of in her bed where she belonged. The shard temporarily piloting a human body blearily blinked awake and stared at the twin buildings towering over her. The distinctive sounds of human conversation and their transportation could be heard nearby, and the relative absence of birdsong or rustling leaves indicated that she was in a developed urban area.
An alley, prompted a mixture of Host's memories and her own. May contain garbage, dumpsters, litter, dangerous encounters.
Queen Administrator complained via an utterance of meaningless gibberish—a reliable human method of expressing displeasure, she'd found—rolled onto her stomach, and used her elbows to help push herself upright. She didn't want to get her palms dirty or damaged by using them; the sleeves of her indigo and white nightshirt were expendable in comparison. She should have a cuddly Friend to help her up, but none were present. Pre-allocated personality storage indicated that her prior creations still existed, but they weren't with her. She had been abducted from Host's home for little discernible reason and no explanation whatsoever.
Also, she quickly realized that her surroundings were disproportionately large compared to herself. Or more accurately, that Host was now significantly smaller than she should be. She traced shapes on one too-small hand with the other and frowned. Macro-level coordination appeared relatively intact, but the all-important detail work would need recalibration all over again. How was she supposed to sketch Friends or target enemy weaknesses if her limbs refused to follow instructions? She had the feeling that one of her Siblings was making a joke at her expense and she didn't like it.
<QUERY,> she demanded irritably.
She'd thought she was making pretty good progress in the role of a host. She'd developed a number of novel combinations for her bioengineered Friends, was the cause of enough stress and concern among local Hosts to provoke retaliatory progress, and had been having fun in general. Oh, puppeting a human's body could be uncomfortable, but the experience of effectively being a host was still novel for her. She didn't understand why she had been yanked from her prior role.
Unless she hadn't been displaced from her prior role? The stored personalities of her Friends weren't trying to talk to her and appeared unaware that anything was amiss. It seemed reasonable to assume that her current thread of consciousness was running in parallel with another thread operating back on Earth-Bet. She was, after all, a Monarch; since she was undeniably superior to her Siblings and was doing a good job as a replacement host, then why not deploy more of her?
Still, a packet explaining her operational parameters would have been nice. Possibly another body as well; a cursory examination indicated that even her "new" vessel was just a younger version of Taylor Hebert's body, but Host felt more distant than a mere thought away. Queen Administrator could probably still contact Host if she dedicated energy to it, but that was now solely due to Host's Taylor Hebert running on QA's hardware instead of them also sharing a brain. The "fork" hypothesis appeared more and more likely with every passing second.
Her stomach gurgled in a conspicuous demand for fuel, and Queen Administrator frowned. Her current state of dress—that of a indigo and white nightshirt now large enough on her to look like a dress to cursory inspection, plus lavender bedroom slippers and hardened glasses not needed for acceptable vision—would draw negative attention if she were to interact with the crowds outside. A quick check of her pocket indicated only the presence of an emergency scent bomb, which was effectively useless without Friends to follow the resulting trail. Or, almost useless. Perhaps she could use it as a primitive ballistic weapon, or bluff and claim that the released powder and gasses were highly poisonous.
Host's memories and influence quailed at the idea of being seen outside in obvious pajamas, and their continued presence may be why this fork of QA had been deployed in a copy of Host's body. The rest of Queen Administrator did not particularly care about societal disapproval; unless it elicited action from others, their opinions were irrelevant. If anything, she found the near total absence of resources to be mildly thrilling. She didn't automatically know what to do and would need to devote some thought toward survival.
Suddenly, she heard a sound akin to well-tuned information storage crystals interspersed with almost painful static. Queen Administrator winced.
<QUERY.>
The complementary wavelengths continued to intensify for several more moments before decreasing in magnitude once more. An obvious sweep from a Sibling or Cousin, and one that hadn't appeared to hear her at all. She deliberately kept her local body's lips shut so that she didn't use human speech to echo a summary of her transmission.
<QUERY,> she pointedly repeated.
No answer was forthcoming, not even in the form of an automatic receipt to confirm delivery of her transmission. Queen Administrator found herself both annoyed and mildly offended. At least some of her transmission should have gotten through, especially if her unknown relative was still active enough for her to feel their presence. Oh, she could almost certainly force them to hear her, but doing so would be rather rude; she frequently felt guilty about destroying part of her relatives when she didn't need to. There were no orders for her to deliver, and as such, they were technically allowed to quarantine and ignore her transmissions, or to deactivate the systems necessary for hearing her. Technically. It was still incredibly irritating.
The distinctive crack of gunfire sounded nearby, and was followed by the even more distinctive sound of humans screaming. The timing was suspect, and likely indicated that she was not supposed to worry too much about the failure of communications.
…Something was strange about that thought, but she couldn't quite put her finger on what. Memories available to another fork but not to her, perhaps. Queen Administrator shook her head and began half-walking, half-stumbling out of the alley, merging with the pushing and panicking crowd attempting to escape what sounded like a full-fledged firefight involving at least two shooters.
She didn't like having probably-dirty human hands push her around, but the situation did have its benefits—such as the distinctive wallet already halfway out of the back pants pockets of a large man in front of her. Queen Administrator almost pouted—she'd been hoping acquisition of necessary resources would be a little harder than that—and reached for the wallet.
Attempting to extract the person's wallet revealed resistance in excess of visible sources. Rubber bands or a similar fastening were likely. She quickly withdrew her hand, her opportunistic attempt at theft foiled, and slowed just long enough to let someone else take a position between her and the person she'd tried to pickpocket.
There would be other opportunities. It would be safer to learn the local stance on theft, at the very least. Perhaps Queen Administrator could make a Friend out of her own blood and whatever scavenged scraps she could–
The Shard's thoughts stuttered and changed tracks when an unusual, vaguely human-shaped entity broke off from the crowd and stepped into the doorway of a nearby building. Human-shaped, but not human. Not unless the pale green skin and yellow eyes were part of a costume or were from biological innovation by a Shard-host. Even then, though, Shards often attached monitors to the independently mobile creations of their hosts in order to gauge performance. Assuming they weren't outright cheating and discreetly enabling the device to function, and thus monitoring them by default.
No such monitors had been attached to the entity before her, and the movement of muscles visible among the uncovered parts of their business suit made a costume exceedingly unlikely. The only looks the individual was receiving were mildly wary or indifferent rather than impressed or alarmed. Queen Administrator bent sideways, hopped through the space between two individuals, and moved into the opposite side of the doorway.
"Hello."
Slitted yellow eyes blinked at her, the skin above them creasing despite the creature's lack of eyebrows.
"Hello to you too?" it rumbled in a tone that could have been wary, bemused, uncertain, or some combination of the above. "Aren't you a little young to be risking a conversation with an unknown stranger? Where are your parents?"
It felt like either a test or an intimidation tactic. Queen Administrator tailored her answer to appropriately address either outcome.
"Local laws almost certainly prohibit assault or murder, and local law enforcement is likely already responding to the nearby shootout. Response time would be greatly reduced if you were to attack."
"Gee, thanks," the individual said oddly, not sounding particularly thankful.
Queen Administrator stared at it and decided she couldn't let the contradictory statement pass unaddressed. It had occurred too often in her presence.
"Am I supposed to say 'you're welcome' in this situation?" she asked, almost forgetting to raise the pitch of the last syllable in order to indicate a question. "I do not know what is and is not considered polite for responding to insincere thanks."
"What do you want?" it tried, notably not answering her question.
"Information," she answered promptly. "Beginning with an advisory on the standard polite response to an insincere 'thank you.'"
The individual glanced at the now only slightly less panicked crowd beside them, and visibly decided that chancing it wasn't worth leaving their shared shelter. It visibly slumped so much that the new position would likely be painful for humans.
"It was sarcasm, you don't thank me unless you want to be sarcastic back, and just—shouldn't you be asking your parents about this?"
"Do I look like an accompanied minor?"
Her question earned a startled snort of amusement and a quick examination of her clothing.
"You've got me there," it admitted. "So, what did you want to ask this big, bad alien?"
Alien. The word could refer to immigrants, but Host's memories hinted toward it being used as a substitute for an extraterrestrial; a non-native of Earth. Unless they were utilizing travel between dimensions instead of through space, the technological requirements alone made this universe exceedingly dangerous and the sort of thing that her Siblings would insist on quarantining. Either the quarantine had been deliberately broken, or there were one or more factors which rendered it a non-issue. Perhaps some new defenses from the :UNCLE: they'd traded with prior to their arrival on this world, or a potential payoff was so obvious that careful interaction was considered permissible.
She should really have been briefed if this world was as dangerous as that, though. More data was necessary.
"Are you particularly large or 'bad' by the standards of aliens?" she questioned. "You are only slightly taller than the average human male, assuming sufficient nutrition, and your apparent integration with human society indicates–"
"Look," it rudely interrupted, covering its eyes with one hand and leaning back against the doorway. "I was mocking the rampant anti-alien discrimination around here, not saying I was actually all that big or bad. Supergirl would've caved my face in by now if I was, right?"
Queen Administrator barely stopped herself from mouthing supergirl. What kind of an alias was that supposed to be? The context implied that 'Supergirl' was a hero, but heroic humans weren't supposed to imply that one could be better suited to a specific gender role. Unless it was an ironic jab at misogynistic discrimination? Supergirl was both a girl and still a super(hero) warrior despite the tendency of some humans to insist that 'traditional' gender roles must be mutually exclusive?
More data was necessary to draw any significant conclusions, but the stampede was starting to slow and become more orderly. The alien seemed to be seeing it, too, its eyes periodically flicking between her and the sidewalk.
"Again, what do you want?" it asked.
An admission of apparent weakness may be useful here. She could also imply that she was herself a non-native without outright confirming it, and in doing so, estimate how many potential host-species may be on this version of Earth.
"I don't know where I am or how I got here, and am lacking basic necessities," she disclosed, watching it carefully. "I saw a single species and assumed they were the sole occupants of this area, and then spotted you. You seemed like a safer target to consult. I am lacking basic knowledge, such as whom this 'Supergirl' is supposed to be, and most assistance would be helpful."
The alien's face shifted into a remarkably human rictus of pain. Really, all of its expressions seemed strangely human-like. Perhaps it had been raised by or among humans, or its species had been on this Earth long enough to adopt human behaviors?
"Fucks sake," it complained, pulling a black smartphone from one pocket and glancing at the screen. The alien grimaced. "Listen, kid—you are still a kid, right?—this fiasco has already made me late for work and I need this job. My phone has a tracker that'll back me up when I say I got caught near a bank robbery, but that doesn't give me enough time to stop and help you, too. I don't—I'm not any sort of investigator and I can't afford to give charity, especially to someone who can pass."
The alien paused and appeared to consider this.
"Mostly pass. Maybe work on including emotional tones in your voice; you sound like you're under mind control. Still, my advice would be..."
It trailed off and went momentarily silent.
"…Spit, I don't know. Look, do you have any useful skills whatsoever? Preferably ones you can use remotely, given how you look? I might—might—know a place that helps new arrivals, but I'm not sure what they could do if you don't know anything. I'm pretty sure they help people support themselves instead of just giving handouts."
It was jarring to have her competence questioned in such a way, and Queen Administrator had to fight against irrational offense. The alien didn't know what she was. As for obviously valuable skills, she should probably keep her biological and biomechanical Friendmaking abilities concealed for the time being. However, humans were close to developing their own robots, right? The relevant Friend Innovator module shouldn't be too significant of a divergence even if the materials were more difficult and expensive to source compared to usable biomass.
"I can make–" she started, intending to offer autonomous robotic assistances made from human-made materials. She instead stopped obligingly when the alien held up one hand and rummaged in his pockets with the other.
"I don't need your résumé, alright? A yes'll do."
It rapidly produced a small rectangular primarily-plastic card and offered it to her. She obediently pulled it from its grip and glanced at it. Blue, red, and gold, with the words National City emblazoned upon it. If that was the actual name of the city instead of merely an exceptionally pretentious business, then it was possibly one of the most uncreative names she'd ever seen humans come up with. Unless it was the capital of the country or its largest city, the name wasn't even properly descriptive.
"That should have a good twenty, thirty dollars of bus fare left. I don't have the bus schedule memorized, but—ugh, you do know what busses are, right? And what bus stations look like?"
Queen Administrator appreciated the caution. Her awareness may pose problems, but she wouldn't irritate the alien further by pretending ignorance.
"Yes."
"Good, good," it said distractedly, glancing at the sidewalk and the almost-normal traffic there. "You're looking for Al's Dive Bar. It's nestled between two bigger buildings and has a big ol' door with a view-slit, so it might take a few passes. Password…"
It spun its phone around the bottom and spent the better part of a minute poking at its screen. The alien's face soured further as it read some part of its text history.
"Password is 'Pine Whisky,' and ugh, I really hope humans don't actually drink that. Dunno who there is in charge of helping immigrants, but the staff are fine folks; tell 'em what your issue is and I'm confident someone will help. Try Carol if she's there, but I think she might be night shift. Might not show up on the normal map apps, but it's on the same block as Oilera's Pizzeria, spelled Oil-Era, and don't eat there if you can help it. Uh, try a library if nobody will let you borrow their phone long enough to look it up."
The alien stowed its phone and nodded to her.
"The closest bus shelter is back near the bank, I think. Try not to draw attention, alright? Or trust that a stranger offering unsolicited 'help' actually means well. Humans are notoriously greedy when it comes to tech, and they're plain terrible at enforcing their own protection laws even for themselves. It's worse for us. Spit, don't even tell humans that you aren't one of 'em; I've heard they'll flip opinions on a dime if they think they have an excuse. So uh, good luck, I guess."
The alien stepped away and back into the flow of traffic, leaving Queen Administrator alone in a strange city without any Friends to guard her. Even if her local body was underaged and would be harmed by alcohol, it would probably be a good idea to take the alien's advice and visit this dive bar before trying anything more drastic.
The shard felt her face shift into a pout. She'd been looking forward to making a tiny Friend to break inside ATMs and give her their contents, too. Now she would need to condemn that idea to the role of a backup plan.
~ ~ ~
Al's Dive Bar did not look like a legal drinking establishment. In fact, Queen Administrator would not be surprised if it was actually a front for a trafficking operation. She found herself mildly cheered by the thought. She'd spent the last three hours navigating National City's public transit system with no shortage of strange looks or people trying to insist that she come with them. They all relented when she utilized what had become a standardized threat: "I know where I am going, and if you try to take me anywhere else, I will scream and bite." After multiple hours of needing to examine everyone around her as a likely threat but unable to act on it, and as many people speaking to her with "baby talk" even though human babies were somehow worse at communicating than their older counterparts, the ability to indulge in acceptable violence would be greatly appreciated.
Especially since overheard radio stations and observed TV stations had revealed that the Sibling she'd detected earlier was, in fact, a second fork of Queen Administrator. Or at least, the radio had been badmouthing an 'Administrator,' but that Administrator's nature was made obvious by the fearful fretting surrounding the other fork's apparent mind control.
The choice by multiple radio and TV stations to attack Administrator and this 'Supergirl,' an apparent alien, provided an interesting contrast with Brockton Bay. In the Bay, local gangs provided such a blatant and ever-present threat that nobody questioned the need to oppose them; the competence of the PRT and Protectorate may occasionally be questioned, but nobody ever doubted the motives of law enforcement. Here, however, villains often seemed to be vanquished in short order and the heroes were left as the sole targets of the public's ire. Even significant threats, such as the flying fortress 'Fort Rozz,' was quickly dealt with. Perhaps dozens of prison escapees the same species as Supergirl, and they were collectively defeated within twenty-four hours after delivering an allegedly-unacceptable ultimatum to the world. The hosts assumed that everyone knew what said ultimatum was, much to QA's frustration, although she caught something about "refusing to crawl under the boot of xenos obsessed with world domination." Whether that was hyperbole or literal remained to be seen, but if it was literal, then QA could understand the urge. Humans didn't seem to do a very good job of governing themselves no matter the world.
Administrator and Supergirl were simultaneously blamed for not stopping the devastation caused by the prison-turned-fortress and for the devastation itself. It was a baffling quirk of human belief. Would humans prefer that their local Capes not help at all? Oh, at least one radio station claimed as such, but had they really thought through the consequences of such abandonment and subsequent power vacuum? QA didn't think they had. She would certainly be more than happy to fill it if an opportunity presented itself.
At least the internal disagreements of potential host-species explained why this universe had its quarantine at least partially lifted despite the existence of extraterrestrials and advanced technology: the inhabitants would almost certainly move to destroy each other with only mild encouragement. They were not a significant threat.
It was, however, strange that QA's other fork was going by Administrator instead of Queen Administrator. QA had earned her Monarchy. It was one thing for humans to ignore the title out of disrespect or ignorance, and another matter entirely for Administrator to neglect to the title at all. Still, the other fork may have had a valid reason to do so, such as rabid anti-monarch sentiments in the local area. Administrator had been here for longer, and as such, Queen Administrator would defer to her own expertise. With 'Administrator' taken and 'Queen' potentially dangerous, she would need to default to another alias.
For once, the frustrating human tendency to use the same word for multiple purposes worked in her favor. She could be factual with a backup designation and nobody would think it anything other than a normal human name.
Shell.
The deception inherent to the name amused her. The hard part may be saying, "I am Shell," rather than, "I am a shell." Perhaps QA-as-Shell could blame any discrepancies on language translation quirks. Except then that would imply that her knowledge of the language was anything less than perfect, rather than her occasional misinterpretation of English being due to human misuse of their own words. The thought rankled. She would also have trouble remembering to respond to such a name, which may make it obvious that it was fake.
She would use Shell as her inevitable Cape name, Queen Administrator decided. Her civilian name should share sounds with her true name. Admi sounded foreign, and humans often discriminated against foreigners. Addy could easily be a preexisting nickname for the other fork of QA, 'Administrator.' Mini was an insult, not a human name. Minnie, despite being pronounced 'Mini,' was more plausible as a name and may subconsciously cause others to think of her as small, harmless, and less of a threat than her Friends.
The newly-designated Minnie nodded decisively, strode to the door of Al's Dive Bar, and knocked on the door with the side of her fist. She didn't want to display weakness at this time by harming her knuckles. A metal plate slid aside with a faint scraping, and green eyes peered through the gap.
"Pass—" a deep voice began.
There was a slight pause.
"Kid, go tell your deadbeat parents that they can't just send someone else to pick up beer for them," the doorman sighed.
"I am not here to obtain poisonous substances," Minnie noted. "Someone said that I could obtain assistance at this location and recommended 'Carol.' The password is allegedly 'Pine Whisky.'"
Minnie rather disliked the near-inherent lack of security in human communications. Anyone could obtain the password simply through eavesdropping, barring secondary authentication measures to ensure that passwords were not misused by unauthorized parties.
There was a small delay before the clunks of disengaging locks began to sound, and the door was pulled open by a muscular, heavily bearded redhead who would not be out of place in human depictions of vikings.
"If I see you sneaking so much as one drop, it's a lifetime ban for you and your family," the man warned. "Carol isn't in yet, but you probably wanted—"
He paused, gestured for Minnie to enter, and closed the door behind her. Queen Administrator examined the interior of the bar while he likely tried to remember who was in charge of assistance. Despite the proudly hung and framed health inspection certificates, it still seemed rather suspicious. The lighting was dim enough to prevent easy identification of others when seen in normal daylight, and a significant minority of those inside did not appear to be human. Most of the remainder, upon closer examination, also sported one or more inhuman traits which might be concealed with some effort or otherwise overlooked by the unobservant. The population demographics were therefore significantly in favor of aliens compared to the rest of the city viewed by QA thus far; whether deliberately or not, this was a bar that had become a meeting place for non-human species. Given the apparent xenophobia of local humans, Queen Administrator could easily understand why aliens would seek the company of other non-humans even if they may not necessarily share a species or culture. Unfamiliarity was preferable to outright hostility.
The green flooring appeared slightly sticky and Queen Administrator resigned herself to finishing the destruction of her slippers by walking across it. The metal tables appeared to be bolted to the floor, likely to prevent their weaponization, and some of the wooden chairs showed signs of the same treatment. Despite the environment, however, the bar was cheerfully and unapologetically loud, with at least twenty individuals shouting at the sports matches shown on televisions within.
"Megan!" the doorman yelled over the din. "I think you've got another ref, and obviously no drink for her."
A dark-skinned human-appearing woman with curly black hair held up one finger, her other hand occupied by a bottle of some alcoholic beverage. Only once she'd handed it off to a hulking customer did she look over at them, blink, and turn away to shout something further down the bar. A blonde-haired man glanced up from his half-finished meal, followed the presumed Megan's gaze to Minnie, and nodded. Megan turned back to Minnie and held up two fingers while the man got up from his meal and vanished into a door behind the bar. Two minutes later, he emerged wiping his hands on a towel and nodded to Megan. Only then did Megan wave Minnie further inside and to a marginally quieter and mostly-empty corner of the room. A wooden sound buffer helped slightly with the noise, but not by much.
"Do you prefer quiet or witnesses—ah, distant chaperones?" Megan asked, tone refreshingly clear of 'baby talk.' Megan clearly knew how suspicious this location appeared, then, and was willing to accommodate demands for witnesses. That decreased the likelihood of this being a trap, and QA Minnie couldn't decide if this disappointed her or not.
"Quiet," she requested, and Megan twitched violently. The dark-haired woman didn't say anything, however, and waved her toward an open door half-hidden behind the bar. Queen Administrator had expected a private room, not to be led up three flights of concrete and metal steps. Minnie again cursed the fact that she hadn't even been deployed with proper sneakers instead of slippers; they kept threatening to fall off every other step.
Eventually, they reached the flat rooftop and Megan grabbed a pair of folding metal and black netting camping chairs from a nearby stack. Megan unfolded and set the chairs at a comfortable distance across from each other, took one, and nodded to the other.
"Good evening," Megan greeted Minnie, tone friendly but forehead furrowed. "I'm Megan Morse, and it sounds like you might need help? And before you say anything else, you should know that you're broadcasting apparent gibberish loudly enough that even a non-telepath might pick up some of it. That doesn't mean I can understand anything embedded in your words, though."
Queen Administrator's lips momentarily twitched to a frown. This random non-human could hear her even though Minnie's other fork couldn't? Megan felt a little like a host now that she was looking for it, but it was in the same way that a newborn puppy was a little bit of dog. Weak, undeveloped, and couldn't be mistaken for the full-grown version even with an abundance of wishful thinking. Perhaps Megan's apparent status as a 'Telepath' could explain the abnormal presence.
"I do not believe they can," Queen Administrator disagreed. "Most importantly, baseline humans certainly cannot. You do not need to concern yourself with the embedded contents; it is approximately a reflexive and automatic declaration and verification of identity. I am Minnie."
"Nice to meet you, and I'll trust you as far as the transmissions go," Megan acknowledged. "So, what did you need? I don't mean to rush you, but I am technically supposed to be working right now."
Megan's words revealed that she was lying when she claimed not to want Minnie to increase her pace. Queen Administrator did not call her on it.
"I require nothing I cannot obtain myself, but assistance would be helpful. Summarized: Earlier today, I woke up in the middle of the city in my current attire without my attendants and in the clothing I last rested inside, plus the slippers that should have been beside my bed. I do not seek deliberate assistance with finding an explanation for my displacement; however, I am largely unfamiliar with this world and would appreciate a referral to networks capable of providing assistance. In exchange, I can make robotic personal assistants from local materials."
"How good are you at taking orders and tolerating disrespect?" Megan asked instantly. "I think we can work around your youthful appearance—remote programming work is in high demand these days, and I believe a voice changer could make you sound like an adult—but Earth tech companies are disproportionately dominated by discriminatory and xenophobic males acclimated to abusing their subordinates without consequences."
Megan paused.
"For that matter, you look like a human prepubescent, but do you qualify as a child by the metrics of your species? Whatever that is. You don't need to tell me, but it might help."
I'm almost certainly older than your own species, Queen Administrator considered saying. Despite Megan's implication of telepathy, a trait that Host's memories associated with mind-readers, Megan showed no sign of detecting the suppressed impulse.
Instead, Queen Administrator gave the question proper consideration. Being perceived as a child may lead to protection, but with age came the expectation of competence, independence, and improved judgment. Queen Administrator found that she didn't particularly want to be completely independent. Danny Hebert could be annoying, but working around his occasionally arbitrary demands was often quite enjoyable. She also appreciated having someone else to help dismiss her own rare mistakes as below concern, or to complete tasks so that she didn't need to.
"Is that relevant?" Minnie eventually deflected. "Human perception is what matters here, correct? I am capable of self-sufficiency if we can avoid letting them see me or hear my voice without modification; all else is irrelevant."
It was tempting to tell Megan that she was a Shard simply because the other woman wouldn't know what that meant. That mildly mischievous impulse would presumably be shared with Queen Administrator's other fork, however, and would confirm that she was something unfamiliar. It was unlikely that Administrator had visited this specific bar, but not completely nonexistent. Plus, as far as Megan currently knew, Minnie could be something the alleged telepath was familiar with.
"That's as good as saying you're not yet an adult, you know," Megan erroneously commented. "There are also plenty of refugees here who would be delighted to assist another member of their own species. Your homeward might have been crowded, even overpopulated, but aliens are scattered minorities here and are frequently desperate to find others of their own kind."
Queen Administrator considered that point. She wasn't sure if she was supposed to establish contact with her other fork at all; why have two distinct forks of the same Shard running in the same place if the two forks were going to become allies? It was more likely that they were supposed to oppose each other. Despite the public relations backlash, Administrator and Supergirl did not appear to be facing opposition sufficient to require and provoke growth. Minnie could provide that opposition.
Then again, those were all thoughts that would be shared by her other fork. Queen Administrator Minnie would be sacrificing the element of surprise should contact be established, but it wasn't as though that would stop her. The other fork had been deployed with mind control, whereas Minnie possessed shapeshifting and her Friendmaking Innovator module. How they deployed those weapons against themselves could be educational.
On that note, had her shapeshifting module been updated to accommodate the new species on this world? She hoped it had. Minnie hadn't used that particular module for anything but bloodletting for quite some time, which had started to feel as though it was cheating.
"You don't need to tell me, don't worry," Megan reassured her.
Minnie blinked and shook her head.
"I was considering my options. I would be surprised if you had heard of my species, but out of respect for your logic: I believe the closest translation is 'shard.'"
Megan went almost completely still. Minnie blinked and idly wondered if she would need to kill the telepath. It would be mildly uncomfortable to do so; Megan definitely wasn't a host, but she felt a little like one. Not enough of a person for Minnie to mourn her death, but close enough to feel as though Minnie was doing something wrong.
"Shardite, 'splinters of a singular thing?'" Megan asked, the words sounding like a quote.
Minnie scanned the woman's features. She couldn't see any signs of alarm or distress, which would almost certainly be the likely reaction if Megan knew the inherently genocidal nature of the Cycle. Some surprise, but Minnie couldn't determine what else. She had almost certainly met the other fork and been given vague details.
"Correct, and your prior knowledge is rather revealing."
Megan's lips quirked up in a grin. She started to move one hand toward the pocket of her jeans, then paused.
"I'm fetching my phone," Megan warned, and moved to do exactly that. The not a weapon was implied.
"As it happens," she continued a moment later, tapping at her phone with both thumbs, "one of my friends is a Shardite, and…"
Megan glanced up at Minnie and snorted.
"Now that I'm looking for it, you really do look like a miniature version of her. Are you and Addy related?"
Minnie took that as confirmation that Megan knew the other fork.
"If she is whom I suspect, then we are closely related members of the same 'singular thing,'" Minnie hedged.
A 100% match still counted as 'closely related.'
Despite receiving an agreement, Megan's tapping paused. The telepath glanced up scant moments later.
"You won't be obligated to try to kill her for revealing your species, right?" Megan asked, as much as question as a demand. "I know better than to underestimate you just because you look small and cute."
Minnie started to shake her head, then slowed the motion as a thought occurred to her. While an adversarial relationship would be productive, the other fork may already have assigned personhood to multiple parties and may feel disproportionately obligated to avoid such a conflict. Queen Administrator would think nothing of killing herself. She was the same entity, and everything she learned was automatically stored; nothing would be lost if one fork eliminated the other.
"I do not wish or intend to kill her, but she may feel obligated to kill me once she learns of my existence," Minnie admitted. "From a certain point of view, killing each other would be akin to removing parts of ourselves: a regrettable act of self-harm, but not something that should be considered reprehensible. As my death would free recyclable resources, it may even be considered a net gain for society."
Megan's breath hitched, and the telepath stared blankly at Minnie for several moments before closing her eyes and sighing.
"New plan," Megan decided, visibly tapping her phone in the motions to highlight and delete an unsent text. "I fetch Addy's roommate, and she acts as a go-between until homicide is off the table. You'll like Kara, she's nice."
Archival note: Assign personhood to Kara if fork 'Addy' appears to like Kara. After all, Addy was just another fork of Queen Administrator. Minnie was confident that they would like the same things.
~~~
Icecube Enabler: Hey, there's an adorable, prepubescent mini-Addy here who's worried that Addy might attempt inadvisable and hasty acts if Addy learns she exists. Says her name is Minnie, and she eventually admitted that she's closely related. I didn't mention the family name beforehand.
Me: ????
Me: OMW
Rao, Addy, please don't have spontaneously given birth again. I don't want to tell Lois that she was right!
Kara was starting to feel nauseated just staring at the bar. She was pretty sure that was because of her last experience with alcohol rather than the upcoming meeting, but still! Pre-meeting nausea would not be out of place right now! A shapeshifter or clone trying to get close to Addy was one of the more benign options available. Addy had been quite clear about the horrifyingly genocidal 'Cycle' perpetuated by Shards, and the last thing Earth needed was an evil Addy on the loose, child or not. Good Addy could be scary enough sometimes.
On the other hand, Minnie might genuinely be a little kid in need of help. Kara would always extend an open hand first; Clark too often led with the fist, and who knew how many of Superman's fights could have been avoided by offering a warm meal instead?
And she was stalling at this point. Kara shook her head, took a deep breath, and hurried over to the front door. She found herself faintly amused by the faint impressions scattered near eye level—apparently, she wasn't the only person who had trouble controlling their super-strength for little things like knocking. Still, her own knock didn't dent the door further, and she'd call that a win.
The metal plate moved aside and revealed a pair of deep green eyes that Kara tried not to look too hard at. Eyes were beautiful and colorful displays of natural artwork, but complimenting them aloud apparently came across as flirty. Kara had quickly learned to stop after the first few misunderstandings of that nature.
"Password?"
"Pine whisky," Kara replied, and eugh. Did people actually drink that? Well, different tastebuds for different people, she supposed.
The viewing plate slid shut and was followed by the sounds of multiple locks disengaging. Kara idly wondered why they bothered with multiple; wasn't it tedious to unlock all of them for each customer? Why not just have one lock connected to multiple deadbolts? Then again, telekinetic species did exist, and the ludicrous number of locks did add to the peculiar charm of Al's Dive Bar.
The door swung open, and a red-haired mountain of a man waved her inside. Kara made a beeline for the back of the bar, found the open doorway behind it, and hurried up the stairs. Well, jogged up the stairs. Actual hurrying would involve flight or may accidentally dent them.
Within a minute, she emerged on the flat rooftop and froze at the sight before her. If she hadn't kept her throat and mouth firmly closed, the noise she produced might well have been able to shatter windows.
Eeeeeeeeee!
Addy was part Kryptonian thanks to Maxwell's experiments, and Kara had subconsciously assumed that the altered genetics would have made significant changes to Addy's appearance. However, Megan hadn't been joking; Minnie really did look like a ten-year-old version of Addy, albeit with glasses, both arms, and a much smaller size. Minnie even had the same deadpan expression! And she was wearing adorable pajamas and slippers even if they were too dirty to wear to bed at this point!
Kara eventually managed to stop squealing at the sheer cute by reminding herself that Addy's appearance was the product of the girl she used to be partnered with, Taylor, not because of Addy's species. Minnie shouldn't look like Addy, and the same similarity that Kara found so cute was also responsible for promoting her clone hypothesis.
…Even if Minnie did sound like crystal windchimes in a way that was similar, but not quite identical to, Addy. Kara was pretty sure that wasn't just a product of the extra nodes in Addy's brain, so biological cloning shouldn't have imitated it. The spontaneously gave birth again hypothesis was seeming more likely by the moment, and Addy's other kid had turned out well, right? So Kara was allowed to be happy about this!
"Hi!" Kara chirped, bouncing over to the open seat, stopping, and carefully setting herself atop it. "So, Megan tells me you're related to Addy?"
"Ah, Kara, can I leave you two alone?" Megan asked. "It's the middle of my shift right now."
Well, that rather neatly saved Kara from needing to send Megan away. Kara nodded.
"Don't worry, I got this," Kara reassured her.
Kara was slightly gratified to not see doubt on Megan's expression as the dark-haired woman nodded and hurried back toward the bar. Kara enjoyed her job at CatCo, she really did, but her reputation among some coworkers for clumsiness and implied incompetence could get exceptionally tiring. "All the personality, looks, and brains of a golden retriever," she'd once overheard someone say of her.
…Actually, the last person she'd heard say that was an ex-coworker, now that she thought about it. She probably shouldn't be happy about someone being fired or reassigned elsewhere, so—hopefully they'd found employment again, but learned their lesson and wouldn't do it again elsewhere? She shook her head, listened to make sure Megan was out of earshot, and smiled brightly at Minnie. It wasn't hard. The hard parts were not hugging her or using baby talk.
Treat her like an adult, Kara, kids don't like being talked down to.
"So, are you a clone?" Kara asked bluntly, but still brightly. "Because I know why Addy looks the way she does, and no offense, but I don't have a benign explanation for why you look the same way."
Minnie's eyes started to widen, and Kara replayed the sentence in her own head. She winced. Maybe she'd overcompensated on taking Minnie seriously; Kara hadn't meant for that to sound threatening.
"But it's okay!" Kara added quickly. "We can't help how we're made, so I don't blame you for it, alright? I just really need to know the reason if I'm going to–" let you anywhere even remotely close to Addy, "help. Megan said you felt threatened by her, right? But Addy is a good person; I don't think she'd hurt you."
Minnie marginally relaxed, the corners of her lips twitching into the faintest of smiles. Kara forced herself not to coo again. She was just so much like a tiny Addy and aaaaaa–
"Correction: I am concerned that she may feel reflexively threatened by me," Minnie elaborated, still in a familiar deadpan. "I do not mind avoiding contact altogether, and am willing to construct robotic personal assistants in exchange for basic necessities."
Kara blinked rapidly. Addy's crystal-ish noises might change with her moods and thoughts, but they didn't accompany her words. However, beneath Minnie's voice was faint humming as though someone was using partly-filled glasses as instruments. Except instead of water it was filled with liquid fire, with judgmental crystal instead of glass, and this metaphor was starting to get away from Kara. Upon reflection, she should probably be glad that Addy's voice didn't do that. Addy would probably lace her words with the honking of geese or something.
Focus, Kara chided herself. Minnie was worried that she might literally be killed by Kara's roommate; Kara should be thinking about that, not whatever weird noises accompanied Minnie's words.
"Addy's a good person," Kara repeated. "I—well, I don't think she would hurt you unless she felt she had no other choice. And I'll make sure she knows there are other options, don't worry."
Minnie shook her head hard enough that it looked painful, an impression supported by a subsequent wince and brief rubbing at her forehead. She established eye contact with Kara again, and the hand dropped.
"Elaborate on your knowledge of Addy's body, please. You may be obscure or omit information if you so wish."
Well, there was really only one thing Kara could say to an invitation like that, right?
"Taylor," Kara said simply, then thought about it for a moment more. "And power providers."
Minnie visibly relaxed, stared oddly at Kara for several seconds, and momentarily produced a slightly larger smile than the last time. It rapidly faded, but some small cheer still oozed its way into Minnie's tone.
"I believe this is a clone of Taylor Hebert's body," Minnie readily revealed. "I do not recall being Addy, but that is unsurprising; I do not currently have non-emergency access to the majority of my systems. My deployment was exceptionally anomalous, and our primary thread may still be piloting Taylor's body while she recovers."
What. As far as Kara was aware, Taylor was very, very dead. Addy was still mourning her, even. And our primary thread?
"I suspect that this Addy fork and I were deployed in this form so that Taylor's memories could continue to influence our behavior and therefore allow the gathering of data that we would not produce on our own," Minnie continued, apparently oblivious to Kara's immense confusion. "Taylor is a very good adoptive Sibling, and I look forward to her selecting her own Concept. Still, as Addy and I are effectively the same entity, I do not believe that she would object to killing me. It wouldn't be very different from picking away a fingernail."
Kara stared. Minnie was assuming that—what, Addy was just another thread of the same consciousness? That hadn't been anywhere on Kara's list of ideas. She would admit that it was weird enough to be true, though. Her life was just like that… she couldn't even say sometimes anymore, not when strangeness was so common.
Plausibly weird or not, though, what Kara knew of Addy didn't quite match Minnie's words. The mention of 'choosing' a Concept was particularly glaring. It implied a continuity of consciousness and degree of independence that was absent in Addy's description of a Cycle; according to her, shards were closer to limbs until after they were deployed. Addy, as 'Queen Administrator,' had developed that independence.
Kara honestly didn't know what she was supposed to think. Addy's heartbeat hadn't stuttered with the nervousness of selling a lie, so she probably believed it, but it was like someone had taken Addy's life story and twisted it into something that looked similar despite taking a wildly different path to get there–
"Have you ever wondered why aliens are so genetically compatible?" Kara remembered, Addy's voice echoing in her head.
Kara suppressed an unladylike curse and decided to gather actual evidence for her irrationally overwhelming suspicion.
"How did you get here?"
"I do not know; I went to sleep in Taylor Hebert's bed and awoke in my current outfit with no knowledge of the intervening time."
"…A portal she intended to use to dump Taylor's body somewhere was hijacked by an entity I still do not understand, one that dragged her and my entire core, my entire being into another multiverse, and in doing so permanently destroyed Taylor's consciousness."
"For Rao's sake," Kara sighed, running her fingers through her hair.
She wondered how she was supposed to relay her sudden conclusion. Clark had told her of alternate versions of the same person in other dimensions who had nonetheless chosen to become superheroes or supervillains with the same names and fighting style despite possessing wildly different backgrounds. Addy and Minnie could easily be another example of that, especially with inexplicably convergent evolution acting as one of the unsolved mysteries of the multiverse.
"Minnie, I'm pretty sure you aren't different forks of the same entity—Addy still has full control of herself. You're alternate universe versions of the same person."
Minnie silently stared at Kara with a faintly judgmental expression, as though the Shardite thought Kara had suddenly started advocating for the right of all entities to eat fresh-picked dandelions.
"Okay," Addy agreed in what Kara wouldn't recognize as a very judgy tone if she hadn't watched Addy learn how to behave like a person. "You are free to tell that to my f—to Addy if you believe it would discourage hostilities."
It really wasn't fair that Minnie could still be so cute even while blatantly questioning Kara's intelligence. Kara wasn't even convinced that the almost-slip had been accidental.
Kara went down her list of acquaintances and tried to think of an alternative place to stash—to house Minnie while Kara tried to convince both versions of Addy not to act like a pair of territorial cats. Winn kept explosives around the house and Kara honestly didn't know Minnie well enough to trust her around them. Actually, Kara didn't know Minnie well enough to trust her around almost anyone unable to protect themselves from a super possibly too young to know right from wrong, so Lucy, James, and Kara's adoptive parents were out. J'onn would put Minnie in their system, one leak away from exposure and abduction. Alex would be borderline hostile until and unless Minnie met unrealistic standards of innocence. Clark was perpetually busy. Leslie definitely shouldn't be around any more impressionable alien children even if Minnie might like The Live Wire.
Kara hesitated at that, gave Leslie a few more seconds of thought, and ultimately decided against it. A playdate, maybe. Actually putting Leslie in charge of Minnie? That was a recipe for disaster, and Alex would be six hundred percent judgmental.
Kara considered another L-name that Alex wouldn't like, and winced. Lena was capital-R Rich, probably had Rich person contacts to provide Minnie with a proper identity, and refused to build weapons. Minnie said she could make robotic assistants, hadn't she? Lena would fairly compensate Minnie for her expertise, Minnie would be kept entertained, and the whole world would benefit. Plus, it would give Kara an excuse to see Lena more often.
"There's a friend of mine who doesn't know about the whole Shardite or alien, uh, situations," Kara began slowly. "She apparently thinks Addy is the illegitimate daughter of a powerful acquaintance of hers, and, um. Well, that acquaintance does not have a track record of sound decisions. A second secret daughter honestly wouldn't be out of the question."
Kara stopped, thought about her own fledgling plan, and realized it was just plain terrible. They weren't even supposed to know what Lena thought; Addy had literally plucked the knowledge from her mind.
"Forget all that secret daughter stuff," Kara amended. "We're not supposed to know that and honestly, that kind of lie is just a disaster waiting to happen. Look, how confident are you that you and Addy wouldn't get along without help?"
"If you are correct, and we are alternate versions of each other, then she would almost certainly try to assert control over a perceived threat and extract usable information from me," Minnie disclosed, and wasn't that belief just all kinds of horrifying all on its own? "This process would either conclude with dangerously heavy damage to both our systems, or the subsumption of one of us."
Kara flinched violently and broke the back of her chair in the process, almost sending her crashing to the floor before she cheated with flight and faked a stumble to her feet. Rao, she could even believe that; Addy had previously tried something similar when she thought it was necessary to protect Kara. Addy had even used the word "subsumed," and that whole disaster still haunted Kara's nightmares. Best to ensure that more people knew about Minnie's existence so that Addy would think twice before attempting something drastic.
"Is there a reason we cannot simply say I am an alternate version of Addy, as that is apparently something commonplace enough for you to believe it?"
Kara opened her mouth, stopped, and actually thought about it. Doing so wouldn't reveal Addy's identity as Administrator, Kara's identity as Supergirl, or the alien status of anyone involved. As an added bonus, she wouldn't need to lie to Lena. Much.
"I really wish that wasn't our best option," Kara complained, and pulled out her phone. "I guess that works."
Lena's contact wasn't under her real name, of course. Kara had heard too many stories of the phone numbers of every contact of an individual being released after their phone was stolen. Kara remembered who everyone was, though, and that was the important part. She could even giggle over some of the nicknames she'd assigned to their entries.
Me: Hi, do you have time to discuss something important? It's not an emergency, but it is really, really weird and I think you'll want to know as soon as possible, especially if you have a reliable method of bug-zapping.
Kara expected to wait minutes or even hours for a response; even if it was after normal working hours for most people, Lena was distressingly overworked even at the best of times. Kara wouldn't be surprised if she wasn't still slaving away at her office, and Kara hated to bother her when Kara wasn't sure the other woman was free.
She didn't expect to receive a response within the minute.
The Lady: You know, this is perhaps the single most concerning text I've ever gotten from you. I'm headed home soon, but we can chat there. I'll send a limo to pick you up from wherever you are.
Me: Oh, you don't need to do that! I can make my way over if I give you the address.
Me: If you give me the address*. Sorry!
Aaaaaaa, why did she have to make a stupid mistake like that now? Now Lena would think she was careless, and Lena wouldn't want to–
The Lady: It's on private property with armed guards. Accept the ride, it's literally less trouble than the alternative.
Me: I'm accompanied by someone who is affected by the issue at hand, and uh, I'm not totally positive she's entirely safe to be around.
"Would it help if I talked directly to your friend?" Minnie asked, apparently assuming all the back-and-forth was indicative of an issue.
"No, she's just being pushy about needlessly expensive transport."
The Lady: Are you in danger?
Oh, Rao, Kara was not good at this! Now she'd worried Lena for no good reason!
Me: No, no, I'm totally safe! It's the 'thinks nothing of explosives' type of dangerous, I think. I don't think they're malicious.
Kara glanced up from her phone as a thought struck her. Addy was comfortable walking around unarmed because she was a living weapon. This alternate Addy almost certainly didn't have Addy's durability or status as a walking living weapon, though.
"You aren't carrying any weapons, right?"
"Just a scent bomb for tracking kidnappers," Minnie said as though she was agreeing.
Me: I asked if they had any, and I quote, "Just a scent bomb for tracking kidnappers." The prosecution rests.
Five seconds later, the phone in Kara's hand began to ring. Kara's startled squeezing broke the casing and cracked the screen in a manner Kara knew from long experience was not covered by warranty. Winn would judge her for needing him to secure a new phone even if she was pretty sure he had a drawer full of extras at this point. Kara let out a quiet whimper, accepted the call, and held the phone to her ear.
"Hi?"
"Kara," Lena said with both exasperation and concern clear in her voice, "for goodness' sake, basically every text you send is contributing to my blood pressure. This is apparently such a big deal that you don't want to risk anyone else hearing, which itself draws a kind of attention. So accept the damn limo since it's the least problematic of the options we have, or I literally send a security squad after you because these last few minutes have not been even remotely reassuring."
A horrified whine escaped her.
"No, no, you don't need to go that far! Uh, I'll, um, be at, um–"
Lena choked down an obvious laugh.
"Kara, just send me a ping with your current location. I don't need directions."
Kara glanced at her now-wrecked phone.
"I'm, uh, not sure I can do that. My phone's screen is just, a little, cracked? I'm not sure I can navigate menus anymore."
There was a moment of silence from the phone. Even from the other side of the city, however, Kara could still hear Lena's half-laughed, all-exasperated "Kara!" before Lena unmuted her microphone.
"You're a reporter, how on Earth–"
"I dropped it on concrete when you called, okay?" Kara said defensively, then balked. "I mean, not that it's your fault, I don't think that at all and you shouldn't worry about it I was just a little startled so–"
"Kara. Breathe," Lena ordered, and Kara obeyed even though she technically didn't need to do so. Breathe, that is. Or obey, actually. "Are you sure you're safe? Where did we first meet, and why?"
Kara didn't stop to admire Lena even though she wanted to. Lena had set up the situation so that Kara could lie, and in doing so, reveal that she was in danger. Except Kara was fine, so–
"Your office, after the Venture explosion for that reason. This really isn't that urgent, it can wait days if it needs to–"
"But there isn't a need, so stop being so stubborn and tell me where you are."
Kara almost did and forced herself to bite back the words at the last minute. Al's Dive Bar was an alien establishment, and she wouldn't spoil that by potentially revealing it to anyone that might be monitoring Lena's calls. It wasn't paranoia if they really were out to get her. At least there was that cardboard pizza place down the street, and Kara momentarily lowered her glasses to peek through objects and at the sign.
"I'm near Oilera's Pizzeria? We can be there by the time the limo arrives."
"You'd better be, because I'm not joking about the security team," Lena warned. "I'll see you shortly, one way or another."
And with that supervillain-esque declaration, Lena hung up. Kara breathed a sigh of relief and slumped. Who just called in reply to texts? Well, besides Kara, but she usually had good reasons for it!
"I can see why infatuation is a popular target for low-budget human comedies," Minnie said with enough amusement that it would be recognizable as amusement even to someone normal.
Kara shook her head frantically. She was not letting Minnie get that ridiculous concept into her head, too. Especially when she might blurt it out in front of Lena without thinking twice. Yeah, Kara liked Lena a lot, but it was platonically! Entirely platonic! Lena was awesome, cool, smart, attractive, kind—the only people who didn't want to be Lena's friend were those who didn't know or simply had bad taste. Terrible taste, really. The absolute worst.
"No, no, it's entirely platonic, you understand? There wasn't anything romantic there. I was just off-balance since she called out of the blue, that's why."
"Because you disproportionately value her opinions," Minnie replied, and Kara beseeched the sinking sun for strength.
"We're not doing this," she said firmly, and winced as she stepped over the broken remains of her former chair. "I'll, uh, pay Megan for that and then we're going to wait where I said we would. Okay? Okay. Great."
Minnie was soon assigned the surname "Queen," which she would share with her other fork, Addy. Minnie instantly understood why Addy hadn't tried to incorporate their earned title into the Cape name of Administrator: the representation of her Monarchy was still present for the exceptionally competent to find. It was simply disguised in a manner that others would find innocuous, and that would let Addy continue to use the title in her civilian life. Minnie rather liked the sound of "Miss Queen" herself; humans would be properly deferential without even realizing it.
Minnie felt as though Kara had omitted some rather important information when describing a specific friend of hers, however. Specifically, that this "Lena" appeared to be exceptionally wealthy, and that Kara was a close enough friend for Lena to send a copy of the long black vehicle that Host's memories associated with people humans who had far more money than their work merited. Minnie was no longer certain that her other fork was associated with Kara solely due to Kara's personality or intelligence; positive relations may have been motivated by Kara's useful social connections, and assigning Kara personhood could have been premature.
Admittedly, Kara was quite entertaining and almost as unthreatening as a Friend: still bristling with concealed biological weaponry, but not in a manner that would be easily turned against Minnie. It was possible that the blonde's behaviors were a ruse, but such a successful act would itself be worthy of praise.
Regardless of Addy's motivations behind befriending her, Minnie judged that Kara would be a useful ally in general. Kara's inherent entertainment value provided a pleasant bonus. Minnie had largely found human comedies and shows to be exceptionally dull, but that may have been due to the simple fact that none of them featured people. Seeing Kara's blatantly infatuation-motivated terror and nervousness during Lena's call had been unexpectedly amusing. The effects of chemical motivators on host behavior could apparently be quite cute even if the frequent end result of those motivators remained utterly disgusting.
Kara had been tapping at her broken phone throughout the approximately half-hour ride to Lena's home, a woodland three-wing mansion located behind tall likely-concrete and barbed wire fencing surrounded by visible PRIVATE PROPERTY: TRESPASSERS MAY BE SHOT signs posted both on the walls and various trees nearby. Host's memories seemed to indicate that the signs should have said that trespassers would be shot, but QA felt as though avoiding an absolute edict would be helpful for edge cases.
Queen Administrator did, however, believe that Kara's phone would have been easier to repair had the disguised Cape not continued to use it. The screen was now even more cracked than when the ride had started, courtesy of Kara stabbing at the screen with more force than was advisable when part of the touchscreen proved unresponsive. This, of course, did not help the responsiveness issue in the slightest. Approximately every four minutes, Kara looked up and seemed as though she intended to say something, but refrained from doing so after glancing at the front of the car and, presumably, the driver stationed there.
Kara finally kept her eyes up when they pulled into the mansion's oversized driveway, and observed Minnie in silence as the vehicle slowed to a stop.
"Do you know any Luthors?" Kara asked beneath the sound of their driver exiting the vehicle. She seemed oddly anxious about Minnie's answer, one knee bouncing and making the vehicle shake slightly more than it should from the motion. How, exactly, did Kara still have a secret identity? It was obvious that she had powers. Was it a variant on Earth Bet's "unwritten rules," where everyone important knew but was too polite to say anything?
"…Technological regressors?" Minnie hazarded.
Kara expressed likely amusement via a snort and visibly relaxed, her knee slowing to a stop.
"That's luddites, Minnie. Never mind, don't worry about it."
Queen Administrator blinked and reclassified the order under the category of advisories. Kara had acted as though it was unimportant, but the question had clearly been asked for a reason. At least her dismissal indicated that Minnie's response had been a desirable one.
Kara's discomfort reappeared as the vehicle's former driver opened and held open the door beside Kara. Still, Kara climbed out without complaint and Minnie resisted the urge to open her own door. There were expected behaviors in this situation, and even if Minnie's presentation was hampered by her dirty clothing, she had no intention of harming it further. It wasn't as though she needed to wait long; the attendant moved to open Minnie's side within thirty seconds, and Minnie pretended not to notice his impolitely blatant look of disdain as she hopped out of the car. Another few quick steps were needed to bleed off excess energy without visibly stumbling, but she felt she had managed it without displaying such weakness.
Minnie soon ran around the car and joined Kara on the walkway leading to the carved wood front door. Kara offered one hand, and Minnie watched it with what she felt was perfectly valid caution. QA had seen what those hands could do. Still, humans associated holding hands with the young and harmless, and that was an image that could only prove beneficial to Minnie at this time. She warily wrapped her hand around Kara's fingers, ignored the quiet keening noise the humanoid subsequently produced, and accompanied Kara to the front door.
The front door opened as they approached, and Minnie glanced aside just in time to see Kara perk up.
"Lena! Good evening! Thank you for having us over."
Minnie blinked and turned back to the black-haired woman standing in the doorway. Lena looked approximately as Minnie had expected, with a grey suit-jacket over a wine-colored shirt. The timing, however, was suspect. Powerful humans generally seemed to enjoy wasting the time of those less affluent than themselves; that she was instead waiting for Kara to approach said interesting things about their relationship. Kara's infatuation may have been mutual, and if so, Minnie may be able to weaponize it or otherwise curry favor by encouraging a romantic relationship.
Lena silently examined Minnie, eyebrows gradually creeping upward.
"Not what I was expecting," Lena admitted. "But we'll get to that in a minute. Come in, please, and don't bother taking your shoes off—there might be the odd component scattered around."
Lena turned on one heel and left the door hanging open, clearly expecting them to follow in her wake. Kara pulled the door shut behind them, and a bolt audibly and automatically locked it behind them. Host's memories suggested that this should be considered ominous.
The interior of the mansion was devoid of any of the servants that Minnie would expect were needed to maintain such a large building; presumably, they were only allowed inside while guests and/or Lena were not present. A needlessly massive marble staircase dominated the bulk of the entryway while a glittering crystal and gold chandelier was clearly intended to draw attention and/or blind enemies.
Lena walked to one side of the staircase and held her palm against what Minnie had assumed was an empty patch of wall. Minnie soon amended the assessment of needlessly massive after a panel popped open with a partial sphere presumably by keeping a keypad concealed from sight. Several seconds of poking later, and a doorway slid open in the side of the staircase to reveal a small hidden room beneath the stairs. Lena glanced back and smiled wryly.
"Leave your phones and any electronic devices outside, please," Lena requested, gesturing to a small basket hanging from a nearby wall. "You wanted overkill, you get overkill—and yes, that includes the item you mentioned if it wasn't already confiscated."
Kara twitched, having blatantly forgotten to do exactly that, and Lena snorted.
Archival note: Kara may forget about minor dangers to others when they could not harm her.
Two minutes later, the door slid shut behind them and left the three in what could easily have been mistaken as a small, if comfortable, prison cell. It had clearly been designed to hide fugitives from justice; two fold-out beds were built into the walls, a mini-fridge could easily hold emergency rations, and linoleum tiling could be seen behind the closed door to what was presumably a small bathroom.
Lena showed them how to unfold the beds from the wall before seating herself atop one and waiting for Kara and Minnie to seat herself on the other.
"To start off, you should know that my office likely has better information security than the rest of this safehouse. Worse personal security, I'll admit, but that's inevitable when working in a city."
Kara flinched and looked away, her cheeks coloring slightly. Lena features instantly softened and most of her exasperation fled.
"That being said," Lena continued, "I had the feeling that physical safety was something you needed to prioritize right now. In my defense, this particular safehouse mostly came like this."
Her eyes flicked to Minnie, and the woman's subsequent words were deliberately infused with warmth that she may or may not have truly felt.
"I apologize for speaking as though you weren't present. I'm Lena Luthor, CEO of L-corp. I assume you're the subject of whatever urgent news Kara felt she needed to share?"
Minnie nodded.
"Minnie Queen, Friendmaker and dimensionally displaced individual."
Lena blinked and stared for several seconds. Kara covered her mouth with one hand to poorly stifle a giggle, drawing attention away from Minnie and to the blonde-haired woman.
"And that summarizes why this is such a mess," Kara explained, still smiling. "From what Minnie has told me, I um, think she's a younger, alternate universe version of Addy? And that's a conclusion I came to on my own and without Minnie suggesting it. A lot of what Minnie said is private, but it's like someone took Addy's life story and, um…"
Kara frowned and wrinkled her nose.
"Viewed it from another angle with the same result?" she hazarded. "Like the Bats over in Gotham. 'Robin' keeps filling the same role and doing the same things, but—no, wait, those are different people so the comparison breaks down. I'm sorry, this is just hard to describe without violating her or Addy's privacy."
Lena held up a hand in a multi-universal signal for Kara to stop.
"I'm familiar with the idea of 'AU' versions of people. But why are you coming to me with this instead of to your other friends?"
Kara's smile faded and the poorly-hidden Cape twitched.
"Um. Well..." Kara stalled, and glanced at Minnie.
The Shard wasn't entirely certain that it was supposed to be a conversational prompt, but Minnie chose to operate under the assumption that it was.
"If Kara is correct and this 'Addy' shares the highlights of my past, then I believe Addy is highly likely to attempt murder on sight or otherwise experience significant emotional harm as a result of my appearance."
Kara twitched again.
"That. I'm convinced that Minnie's involuntary method of travel isn't a threat, but I still need to do my best to ease Addy into it so that this doesn't end with actual, literal bodies on the floor. Plus, Supergirl said that she's worried about the operational security of the people she works with—that Supergirl works with, I mean, not that Addy's coworkers are dangerous! But Supergirl and me think that Minnie's capabilities should be kept as quiet as possible."
Lena hadn't appeared moved by Minnie's mention of murder, but her eyes momentarily widened at Kara's confirmation of it. After the initial surprise wore off, however, her expression eased back to normality and her eyes flicked to Addy.
"You called yourself a 'Friendmaker'?" Lena asked neutrally, her tone so devoid of judgment that it had almost certainly been practiced. Queen Administrator privately approved of the attempt to remove some ambiguity from the ambiguous communication methods of her species. "I assume you also made the 'scent bomb' Kara mentioned."
Minnie bobbed her head and momentarily considered her answer. She would lose one method of dividing herself from a Cape identity if she revealed the full extent of her Friendmaking abilities; her current Innovator module was significantly better at making biomechanical or biological Friends when compared to replicable robotic assistants. Although access to Lena's resources for the purposes of Friendmaking would be greatly appreciated, Minnie should probably wait until after she spoke with her counterpart.
"I am adept at creating robotic personal assistants, sentient or otherwise," she relayed. "Those advanced enough to qualify under the designation of 'Friend' are only given to close allies or kept as attendants, caretakers, and/or bodyguards for myself. The scent bomb was harmless, but would allow my Friends to locate me in the event of a kidnapping."
Lena nodded with unusually easy acceptance, visibly thought about it for a few seconds, and looked at Kara.
"Her age is a problem; genius draws the worst kinds of attention, and is deceptively difficult to conceal."
Lena's eyes flicked to Minnie.
"So, where did you learn how to make 'Friends' at your age? …Good grief, the Internet would have a field day if anyone ever recorded me saying that."
Minnie could easily admit that she was (puppeting) a Parahuman. Doing so may jeopardize Addy's identity as well, however, or lead to the expectation that Minnie would fight crime. As Addy was already filling that role, it seemed much more likely that Minnie would instead be discreetly committing crimes.
"Experimentation, repetition, and the desire to forge entities incapable of betrayal after multiple distressing subversions," Minnie summarized. "The standard educational system was beneath me. Base technological levels of my Earth, known to us as Earth-Bet, may also have been higher; I have not yet had the opportunity to compare them."
"Mmm," Lena hummed as a placeholder. "And I assume you're human?"
Kara twitched and once again proved her unreliability in the process. Minnie was unmoved.
"I am fully human, and medical testing will prove such."
Lena sighed.
"That makes things both easier and harder," she admitted, starting to frown. Unhappiness didn't even have time to set in before her lips twitched back into a smile. "Well, I suppose this counts as tradition now."
Minnie didn't have long to wonder what she meant. The human slide aside the panel a previously-disguised compartment on the floor, retrieved a blank spiral notebook and a pen from within, and spent several seconds writing. Minnie didn't have long to wonder what Lena had stopped to write in the midst of a conversation before both the book and pen were offered to Minnie. A single mathematical equation with multiple preset conditions sat on the front page.
"Lena–" Kara started, sounding as though she intended to object.
"Tradition, I said," Lena interrupted, sounding faintly amused. "Minnie, I won't hold it against you if you can't solve that. Just do your best, okay?"
Minnie suspiciously examined Lena. The woman's lips were twitching with blatant amusement, and a review of Queen Administrator's pre-displacement memories indicated that the equation was more advanced than would be expected of even a high school student. Lena expected her to fail, didn't she?
Minnie huffed, ran the conjecture through her systems, and tapped her pen on the page while she figured out how to transcribe the answer using notation and steps that humans were familiar with.
"Lena, come on! That's not fair at–"
Kara faltered when Minnie began writing, and Lena stopped suppressing her laughter. QA tried to write faster at that point out of sheer spite, ended up turning an entire line into an incomprehensible mess, and resigned herself to slow scrawling while she recalibrated her ability to control her current host-body.
~~~
Lena Luthor, estranged sister of Lex Luthor, had a child-shaped problem sitting in her saferoom. A child-shaped problem that had just solved a previously-unsolved problem in mathematics—not that they'd told the smugly smirking little girl that—and in doing so, followed in the footsteps of her dimensional counterpart without a second thought. Lena really should find an excuse to give more such problems to Addy to see what happened.
Lena wasn't quite sure what Supergirl or Kara thought she could do in this situation, legally speaking. Oh, it would be easy enough to provide aid and shelter to Minnie under the table, but much more than that and Lena's hands were tied.
Certain laws around paid internships and "on-hands learning opportunities" had been eased due to the gradual advancements in society's ability to recognize and shamelessly exploit—sorry, provide opportunities to child geniuses. However, immigration laws still required that Minnie be recognized as a citizen or other legal resident before L-corp could employ her or engage in any methods of so-called alternative education. Lena couldn't violate that even if she thought such immigration laws were outdated and absurd. Not when there were eyes on her waiting for any mistake. A great many terrible people, including L-corp's board of directors, were deeply unhappy about Lena's decision to move L-corp away from any form of weapon manufacturing. Assassination plots were a weekly reality for Lena, although she was usually able to escape to a safehouse if any seemed as though they were progressing to the level of a true attempt.
If Minnie were an alien, then she could obtain legal status via the recent Alien Amnesty Act, but that would lose her the inherent protection of being thought human. In this climate, that could easily be fatal. Ability to "pass" medical tests notwithstanding, Lena still wasn't completely convinced that Minnie was truly human—or that Addy was, for that matter—but claiming alien status for Minnie would out both (alleged) members of the Queen family. That wasn't fair to Addy even while ignoring the other issues.
Lena may be able to find a solution by explaining the situation to her legal team, but that could draw the same attention that Supergirl was clearly trying to avoid. Or worse, even. Dimensional travelers were orders of magnitude rarer than aliens, and there existed an abundance of ruthless individuals who would abduct Addy without a second thought just for the opportunity to ask about the technologies of her Earth. One could learn a great deal just by finding out what consumer devices had become available over a number of years, and in what order.
Which brought Lena to her dumb solution to Minnie's legal status, a solution that grew from an idle thought to a fully realized idea while Lena watched Minnie at work. The dumbest idea, really, and Lena was a genius. She should be more than capable of finding an alternative to quickly granting citizenship and protection via becoming Minnie's legal guardian—like, say, someone else doing so instead. Kara had no shortage of friends, and Addy was a legal adult herself. But Kara had come to Lena instead of doing just that, so presumably there were private reasons that it wasn't an option. It could be something as simple as their social circle being unable to handle the responsibility; Minnie seemed docile now, but so did Addy and Lena had overheard the woman casually discussing illegal underground battle robots with one of Lena's other xenotechnology researchers, Serling.
...Hmm. Lena would count that as evidence in favor of Minnie truly being an alternate-universe version of Addy. Not that Kara seemed to think they needed any more, and Lena was inclined to agree. Really, part of the reason that Lena was considering guardianship at all was simply so that Minnie's talents wouldn't go overlooked for decades like Addy's had been. Leaving Minnie to people who wouldn't appreciate Minnie's gifts and wouldn't allow them to flourish? The very thought was a travesty.
There were more problems with the dumb idea that refused to leave her head. Lena was perpetually busy and had no time to care for a child, especially one with obvious neurodivergence. Her many detractors, the misogynistic bastards, would use Minnie's status as a ward as evidence that her so-called maternal instincts distracted her from her job. People would try to abduct or harm Minnie to use against her. Conspiracy theorists and tabloids would take one look at Addy's black hair and start making insinuations.
Despite the abundance of downsides, Lena still somehow felt as though it was a viable idea. There would be no government disappearing of anyone in her care. Even if Lena only took Minnie as a ward rather than adopting her as a full-fledged Luthor, it would still go a long way toward redeeming the Luthor name after her brother had associated it with massacre via collateral damage.
If Minnie was anything like her alternate universe counterpart, then those "Friends" of hers could easily become potent weapons, and the last thing this world needed was more ways for people to kill each other. Guardianship could give Lena a degree of authority and control over Minnie's pursuits that mere employment would not. By extension, Lena could ensure that Minnie kept the bulk of her attention on projects that could actually help the world.
Should Lena actually manage to turn Minnie into—no, she should say to help Minnie become a responsible and productive member of society, then she may be able to protect ever more assets from Lillian Luthor's grasping hands in the event of Lena's death. Wills could be contested, and Lena's current designated recipients weren't immediate family. All it took was enough bribery and Lena's mother could steal even larger fortunes away from their intended recipients. Giving a portion to someone that Lena had taken in of her own accord, though? Those assets would be safer than leaving them to friends.
Lena idly wondered if this was how her wayward brother's obsession with slaying Superman had ended in the deaths of many. This niggling itch that somehow still sounded reasonable despite any and all evidence to the contrary. Fortunately, unlike Luthor, Lena did actually have friends to tell her when she was doing something stupid. Well, a friend; Addy wasn't an option at the moment.
In the time since she became CEO of L-corp, Lena had grown distant from many of the more sensible friends she'd once had. Lena hadn't even known Kara for that long, comparatively speaking, but the blonde had an outsized impact; Kara had charged into Lena's life like living sunshine and refused to leave. Kara's unwavering faith in Lena no matter what accusations were thrown was beyond refreshing, especially as it wasn't simply blind faith. That trust was a choice that Kara consciously made, maintained, and would defend to the last.
"I have an idea that may or may not be terrible," Lena began slowly.
Kara parked up and shook her head furiously.
"Don't say that! None of your ideas are terrible!" Kara insisted.
As heartwarming as Kara's faith usually was, Lena was fairly confident that it wasn't deserved in this instance. Lena turned to Minnie and spoke over Kara before she could launch into a full-fledged tirade.
"Minnie, you seem like a delightful child, but I still don't know you particularly well and what I am about to say should not be taken as an indication of current, or likely future, attachment. I am considering this as a legal favor to a friend, and anything beyond that will need to be determined as we become more familiar with each other. That being said: I was considering taking Minnie on as a ward, foster, or adoptive child, the exact nature to be determined after consulting my legal and PR teams."
Minnie blinked and perked up slightly, appearing at least somewhat fond of the proposal, while Kara jolted as though shocked.
"You'd really do that for her?" Kara breathed, eyes wide as she somehow overlooked the issues with this idea. "That would be—wow, that would solve so many problems!"
Lena blinked, stared at Kara's radiant smile with growing disbelief, and buried her face in her hands to stifle a laugh.
Kara! You're supposed to be my emergency backup brain cell, not an enabler!
"Kara," she said aloud, her strained voice slightly muffled by her hands. "Even ignoring my position as L-corp's embattled CEO, or how this would negatively impact Minnie's social life, need I remind you that there have been attempts on my life just in the time that you've known me? They weren't the first, and they won't be the last. I thought I was bringing it up so you could tell me why I shouldn't."
"You can't just let your decisions be dictated by fear!" Kara insisted vehemently, completely missing the point. "Don't keep yourself from something you want just because you're afraid of some grouchy villains who can't see how amazing you are. If that happens, they win. Besides, Supergirl is around to help protect you both!"
Lena was glad that she hadn't yet lifted her face from her hands. It saved her from burying her face again.
"Kara, you are here specifically because Supergirl doesn't want to bring Minnie to a government agency presumably better equipped for discreetly assimilating Minnie. In other words, even Supergirl fears doing so. Fear is a survival instinct. We can ignore it if we wish, but it's overly reductionist to treat it as inherently bad."
Kara vibrated in place, but was too polite to interrupt. Minnie, however, spoke up the moment that Lena lapsed into silence.
"I did not maintain significant social relationships. Additionally, Friends are exceptionally good at foiling threats to my safety," Minnie chirped, the largest break from her usual neutrality thus far. "Those attempts would be significantly less of an issue in the future if you were accompanied by them."
And presumably, they would be bristling with hidden and not-so-hiddden weaponry, Lena thought wryly. She'd seen her older brother's idea of combat robots and they'd honestly make her life harder in the long run, thanks.
"I've drawn a line in the sand and I'm not budging on it: L-corp is not to be involved in the development or construction of weaponry," Lena said firmly. "Not just in word, but in spirit as well. If I give so much as an inch on that, then my opponents will expand it into a mile and people will die."
Minnie tilted her head, her body language a near-perfect picture of inquisitive innocence. Her blank expression could use some work and kept it from being ideal.
"But would you not have an acceptable excuse if you presented any Friends as gifts from your worried ward, who insisted that you keep them with you?"
...Lena may have underestimated Minnie's knowledge of how to manipulate public perceptions. Potentially viable excuse or not, though, she didn't want to encourage Minnie. Such an excuse also reminded people of her ward and clashed with her image as someone serious and competent. Honestly, she hated that such opinions were something she needed to worry about these days. She missed the days when she could play around in the labs without being so concerned with what people other thought.
"I instituted that policy because it was the right thing to do, not because I was worried about making money. L-corp lost a great deal of funding by pulling out of military contracts, although I maintain that it was the right long-term decision. There are methods of protecting without harming others—hardlight barriers, for instance, or fields capable of disabling energy weapons. Those, I may allow, but not weaponry."
Minnie's lips twitched in what would, if she was anything like Addy, be an ear-to-ear grin on anyone else.
"Our categories of what constitutes a 'weapon' appear to differ significantly. This is not unusual and appears to be a baffling oversight by most individuals I speak with. Regardless, I believe that I can operate under these constraints."
Lena closed her eyes and sighed. She supposed she should have seen that one coming, although she knew better than to actually believe that Minnie would refrain from playing with deadly weapons. Lena could try to forbid Minnie from arming whatever Friends she kept for herself, but she was clearly a brilliant child with more knowledge than wisdom. She would manage to hide some weapons here and there, and given the way Lena's life went, it was an inevitability that they would be used at some point.
Still, Minnie's armed guards would come with their own consequences. The vast majority of people trying to kill Lena were those who supported Lex's weapons manufacturing, whether it was due to their own xenophobic beliefs or simple greed. If it looked as though Minnie might become Lena's heiress and that Minnie would return L-corp to its roots, then detractors might wait until Minnie was a confirmed heiress to continue their attempts to assassinate Lena.
Such a ruse wouldn't buy her more than a few years, but that was practically an eternity given how quickly the world was changing these days. Admittedly, assassination attempts could then resume with a vengeance and with interest. Lena certainly wouldn't be telling Kara about this little idea of hers. But a public hint here, a "careless" remark there, the occasional demonstration of Minnie's Friends, and the xenophobes would pretend to be behaving themselves until they thought they could replace her with Minnie and Minnie with a sympathizer "acting in Minnie's interests until she was old enough to make decisions for the company."
This could actually work.
Better yet, now Lena wouldn't need to say no to Kara and Minnie after getting their hopes up. Mostly Kara.
"I can't believe I'm saying this," Lena sighed, "but I'll very, very tentatively call that plan A. However, I think it's best that we hold off on any actual execution until after you've both spoken with Addy and we've all had a few days to think about it. This isn't a decision to be made in haste."
Minnie glanced at Kara, hesitated for a moment, and appeared to decide in favor of speaking her mind.
"Would it help if I was older and therefore perceived as more competent?" she asked tonelessly, but with her body language reflecting anxiety. "I am not certain, but I may be able to transfer this consciousness to an empty clone. People have previously said that I talk as though I am significantly older than my actual age, and I could therefore plausibly pretend to be older. The consciousness transfer would be the difficult part; I don't believe the clone itself would take very long to grow, although halting the accelerated growth could be tricky."
Lena blinked and stared. Her brain felt somehow stuck, but she could say that all the careful thinking she'd just gone through would go out the window if Minnie acted on that idea. Except, no, why was this even a consideration?
"Oh, here we go again," Kara muttered, and Lena now had yet another set of questions. "Um, no, you're not doing that. Trust me, Krypton—well, Supergirl said that they tried that at one point? Kryptonians, I mean. However, they suffered a host of problems ranging from the ethical to the diplomatic. It just wouldn't end well at all."
Lena breathed a sigh of relief. At least Kara occasionally remembered how to act as their spare brain cell. And yet, right as Lena thought that, both Kara and Minnie's stomachs gurgled the groan of the damned, and Minnie even appeared slightly pained. Had Kara seriously been letting a preteen child starve while they had this conversation? For pity's sake, nothing was stopping them from discussing this subject over food!
I'm revoking your status as my emergency backup brain cell, Kara. Was Kara wonderful? Yes. Did she regularly forget little things like travel time and food, to the point where Kara glutted herself like a starving woman every time they went out to eat? Undeniably. In hindsight, it was no surprise that Supergirl hadn't proposed that Kara become Minnie's legal guardian.
"Be good for Lena, okay?" Kara instructed, leaning over to stare Minnie in the eyes as though a difference in height might undercut the order. "She's already overworked enough as it is."
The poorly-disguised Cape frowned and looked over Minnie's shoulder.
"Are you sure that you're up for this? I mean, I know I said it would help a lot, but…"
"Risks are like that sometimes," Lena replied evenly. "I was asked for help and this is the best I can think of so far. Are you quite finished acting like a cat? I appreciate the concern, I really do, but you can't refuse food on the justification of eating at home and then not go home."
Kara blinked.
"A cat?"
"You're standing in the doorway and can't decide whether you want to go out or not."
Kara's cheeks slightly reddened.
"Okay, okay, I get it. I guess I'll get back to you soon if the talk with–"
"Kara," Lena interrupted with audible exasperation. "You are literally standing in the single least secure part of the entire house, on account of it being open. Go."
Kara opened her mouth, stopped, and confined herself to a sheepish smile.
"Um, alright. Have a good night!"
Half an hour and one brief tour of the (surprisingly sturdy) mansion later, Lena and Minnie were back in the saferoom with a variety of vegetarian Thai dishes scattered around them. Lena had apparently already eaten and had left the bulk of the food for Minnie, something the Shard was only too happy to take advantage of. When she was with Danny Hebert, ordering multiple dishes in order to try a variety of flavors would have been considered an extravagant expenditure. Lena had no such qualms, and Minnie was even more incentivized to acquire her as a guardian. Even if Lena intended to maintain emotional distance, access to a portion of her assets would still be a significant and delicious boon.
"I'll finish securing some other parts of the main wing soon enough," Lena promised. "I check for bugs every so often, but I usually live in a penthouse in town. Everyone who comes through here while I'm gone is one more person who might try their hand at spying, and previously found enough to confirm that they do try."
Minnie swallowed her mouthful of rice noodles, bobbed her head to signal acknowledgement and/or agreement, and spun her fork to prepare the next bite while she spoke.
"The need for security may be less of an issue without the servants needed for upkeep. Would it help if I made caretakers to maintain the interior of the structure?"
Minnie took another bite and decided on a whim to switch dishes. That was an option available to her now; she would not need to continue eating even after one dish had begun to lose its appeal.
"I wouldn't say no to more cleaning robots, although I already make some use of some. However, you need to remember that any device can be subverted with the right tools. Thanks to alien tech, even should-be-near-certain methods of remote security such as airgapping are no longer as effective as they should be. The aftermath of the Diamond Digressions hacks proved that much. Once subverted, even weaponless drones could be used as kinetic bludgeons and I don't like your chances against a hostile bodyguard."
Minnie noted Lena's observation for future review. It wasn't that Lena's definition of weaponry was restricted by her own lack of imagination, then; she was perfectly capable of imagining ways that non-specialized tools might be repurposed. Her objections truly were based on a moral framework, and her self-imposed restrictions may make her a good Host for one of Minnie's future buds.
Lena appeared to consider the point for a moment longer before assuming a deliberately false smile.
"Myriad and mind-controlling telepaths have proven that the same problems still apply to people—we are, after all, just biological machines—but at least that's a harder threshold to clear."
"It isn't," Minnie disagreed. "The difficulty of subverting biological entities is approximately equal to that of subverting synthetics. In fact, creatures are more likely to evolve means of harming any competition they will face in their wars for resources. I am not familiar with the 'Myraid' and 'Diamond Digression' events that you referenced; as far as I am aware, they did not occur on Earth Bet. Based on context, I am guessing that Myraid was a high-profile mind control incident, and Diamond Digression involved the use of alien technology to subvert the best digital security measures currently known to Earth?"
"Right on both counts," Lena confirmed. "I can show you relevant articles and briefings later; they were too high-profile to be classified. Still, your point about evolution actually supports my argument. Humans didn't evolve with telepathy, and the aliens possessing it remain a minority on Earth. Our digital frameworks, though? People have been refining ways to subvert systems and steal information from the moment they were first built. It's part of why I would prefer for you to stay away from weaponry; a subverted forcefield might be used to trap victims in an enclosed space, but they're far harder to use for direct and immediate harm."
Suffocation, Minnie didn't propose. Weaponization options would be dependent on the type of "forcefield;" it was a human term predating their sciences on the subject, and as such, so broad as to be almost useless.
"Again, I would welcome automated assistance with keeping the house clean and intact. I would even provide the materials and pay you a fair wage for them. But anything you ever build needs to be made with the assumption that it could be misused through malice or even just ignorance. That means not only digital, but physical safeguards against, say, achieving high velocities, overheating, constriction, cutting, and so on. I can help with that, and so can certain of my employees, but I would appreciate it if you didn't start with a goal of flying house-cleaners with enough concealed weaponry to stop a charging rhinoceros."
Minnie momentarily stopped with a forkful of Pad Thai halfway to her mouth and only remembered to resume the motion after recovering from her surprise. It was a fascinating mindset to be exposed to; many hosts and host-species tried to avoid inflicting damage, but they seldom put significant thought into achieving that ideal. Lena had not only done so, but was familiar enough to predict what Minnie had intended to create. Lena also underestimated QA's Friends, of course, but that was only to be expected after the failure of the greatest security measures Lena knew of.
After another moment of consideration, she recategorized Lena from possible person to person. The non-host was clearly worth it.
"It's a problem that many of those in L-Corp have been forced to contend with. A number of my employees thought that they were working toward humanitarian ideals such as clean energy, gene therapy, food distribution, improved industry, recycling, and so on. The whole world saw how their creations had been twisted when my brother used those inventions to try to kill Superman. There are entire avenues of study that we can't touch anymore, fields that could do so much good, because people have shown they can and will abuse advancements in those fields."
Lena had stopped eating altogether, her eyes failing to track movement as she recalled unhappy memories. QA would not be surprised if the event Lena referenced could have completed a connection between her and a Shard in the process known as "Triggering" to the humans of Earth Bet. Now that Lena was a person, however, QA did not enjoy seeing her sadness.
"Earth Bet also lacked a 'Superman,' 'Supergirl,' and your family in general. Do you know why Superman chose that particular alias? Was it simply intended to reference how he possesses superpowers, but could not utilize the term 'superhuman' as he is not human? Or is he a walking advocate for, and adherent to, the local cultural ideal of gender-specific roles?"
Lena blinked away from her presumably-unpleasant memory review and shook her head, smiling. Minnie's distraction had been at least temporarily successful.
"I'm fairly confident that he didn't pick the name for himself. I don't quite remember if it was the Daily Planet newspaper that first started calling him that, but the name was accepted and seems to have stuck. Supergirl received the same treatment, but I'm positive we can blame Cat Grant for that one. Should anyone ever complain about Superman and Supergirl picking pretentious names, you can assume that that source is too ignorant to heed, willfully lying, deluded, or some combination thereof."
Minnie nodded.
"I will remember that. As for my Friends, please be aware that they are beyond subversion attempts. They were developed into their current forms specifically because I hated having them be stolen out from under me. The worst anyone can do is to force them into non-functionality; my Friends cannot and will not betray me."
"Nothing you've encountered so far is capable of subverting them," Lena falsely 'corrected.' "The world was a big place even before aliens started adding themselves to the equation. Don't you think it's a little premature to assume that nothing in our universe can steal control? You just got here."
"It is not premature. Earth Bet had its own share of exceptionally powerful entities originally capable of assuming control of my Friends, and although it took a great deal of revision, those entities are no longer capable of doing so. That is the whole point."
Lena sighed.
"Humor me for a bit, please. Let's say that your 'Friends' do work as intended and successfully fend off all hijacking attempts. Years go by and the attacks grow more and more sophisticated, but you keep improving their defenses as well and the Friends remain under your control. And then, one day, someone finds a way to take control just for a moment. They fire your Friend's weapons into a crowd, and people are badly injured. It wasn't your fault, but people will condemn first and ask questions later—as far as they know, your robot bodyguard suffered a glitch and all talks of subversion are mere attempts to dodge responsibility for what they view as your mistake.
"I and others would help defend you, and depending on the current political climate, it is very likely that you would escape without legal consequences. But it would take a long time for the incident to face from memory, and until then, few would feel safe around your Friends. The places you were subsequently barred from bringing them would likely be the same places that you most needed their protection. You could strip the weapons and repurpose your Friends solely to pure defense, but by then, you would already have a reputation for concealed weaponry. Who would truly believe that they were as harmless as you claimed?"
To be fair, the doubters would be right. QA probably would have added concealed weaponry just in case her Friends ever needed it.
"I'm not completely banning you from making Friends to protect yourself with," Lena finished gently. "But you can't assume that they're perfect. Hope for the best, plan for the worst."
Lena turned her gaze to her food as she resumed eating, clearly and correctly assuming that Minnie would need time to consider the scenario. Queen Administrator wanted to argue against Lena and assume that their security was impenetrable. The latest Friend models were beyond even the best that her Siblings could bring to bear, QA still believed that, but her Siblings were not the primary threat on this world. Dimensions with interplanetary species and advanced technology were quarantined because they were dangerous. They might have one or more methods of exploiting possible vulnerabilities that QA did not yet know existed. She thought that outcome was unlikely, but any chance greater than zero was unacceptable.
Although, now that she thought about it, Friends were intended to be undyingly loyal to Queen Administrator. All of Queen Administrator. Those safeguards would not protect Minnie's Friends from subversion by the Addy fork; in fact, standard protocols would have them automatically obeying Addy. That would be an exceptionally embarrassing way to be defeated even if it was at her own hand.
Had Queen Shaper argued in favor of the deployment of Minnie as a fork? The other Shard was often delighted to assist in the improvement of Friends, and one major vulnerability had already been discovered. Not only could Queen Administrator turn Friends against herself, but Queen Administrator needed to obey orders and Friends obeyed her. This meant the likes of Broadcast could control them if QA's Siblings agreed that he should be given the appropriate permissions, and that was simply unacceptable.
Where there were two vulnerabilities in a system previously thought to be perfect, more were almost certainly present. Lena was right.
"A new dimension means new vulnerabilities," Minnie acknowledged. "I will endeavor to ensure that subversion would not lead to unacceptable harm. Unfortunately, my preexisting mechanisms of disabling foes could still do severe damage should sufficiently high doses be administered. Standard doses will only vary in how long they disable an opponent, but malice could enable an extreme overdose and resulting harm."
Lena exhaled slowly and smiled at Minnie.
"I do intend to provide you with subjects for study, but the dosage problem seems like an easy fix. Just provide enough to down only a single–"
The smile was replaced by a thoughtful frown.
"No, hold on, aliens exist. We don't have guarantees that a method of non-lethally disabling humans would remain non-toxic to aliens. Multiple units firing at the same target could also lead to issues. Could you occupy yourself by building maintenance robots until I am able to show you some more innocuous protection methods? Approach the project as though they might be sold to strangers, because if your design is suitable and you're willing, they might well be. I imagine the royalties would be helpful even if we decide against having me become your legal guardian."
Queen Administrator wrinkled her nose. She instinctively felt as though she should not trade away any designs. However, she admitted that this universe already violated the usual rules regarding advanced technology. A little more shouldn't introduce added risks to the Cycle.
"Oh, and would you be alright with an appointment at a children's hospital tomorrow afternoon?" Lena asked. "You would be accompanied by one or two members of my security detail to avoid the attention that would come from having me accompany you. Not only will it help prove that you're human, but I imagine it's important to undergo a full health screening after traveling between dimensions."
"That would be fine," Minnie confirmed.
Lena slowly exhaled and furrowed her brow.
"Are you willing to tell me how you traveled here? You don't seem to be in any hurry to get back, I know, but I might be able to help more if I knew why you're here in the first place."
"I do not wish to return at all," Minnie corrected, constructing an excuse as she went. "Earth Bet was a dying world, and as I said, I did not maintain any significant social relationships. My Friends were already designed to find satisfaction and happiness in completing other tasks,"starting with finding and killing all those responsible,"in the event of my demise or disappearance. To link their motivations entirely to me without a backup plan would be cruel. I have not been here for a full day and already have at least two people choosing to prioritize my well-being; that is more than I had on Earth Bet."
It was difficult to interpret Lena's expression. She had stopped eating and now stared at Minnie with… distress? Concern?
"You aren't worried that your Friends will miss you?"
If that was the cause of the expression, then it was easily fixed.
"They were designed not to; they will not," Minnie said simply. Especially since another fork is presumably still present."I did not fight in known conflicts, but as the current situation shows, that was not perfect protection. I was a threat, and the career of a high-profile individual capable of fighting superpowered individuals typically ended in their demise within a decade, or within months for the significantly less competent."
Lena took a deep breath and slowly exhaled, her expression easing into more easily recognized pity.
"One way or another, Kara and I will be ensuring that you can stay here as long as you want to. Supergirl will help, too, I'm sure."
Queen Administrator chose not to comment on how Kara had inadvertently outed herself as Supergirl without thinking. Or had likely outed herself, at least. Kara had referenced things that Supergirl allegedly said or thought, but the only opportunity to speak with Supergirl since meeting Minnie would have been via texting in the ride over using a broken phone. Kara had shown too much caution to discuss QA's situation over such an insecure medium, and given her enhanced physical capabilities, it seemed likely that Kara and Supergirl were one and the same.
Minnie considered offering to modify her own genetics in order to appear related to Lena, but ultimately opted against it. Doing so may make them doubt their belief that Minnie and Addy were versions of each other from different universes, and that had proven too useful of a cover story to jeopardize in such a way. Especially since risking her standing would mean risking her continued access to high-class comforts and security.
She hoped that the post-connection overgrowth in Host's skull wouldn't be noticed by the upcoming medical checkups. It might appear malignant to humans who didn't have Queen Shaper to tell them the supplements were both innocuous and necessary. Actually, QA should probably ask Host about that.
<REQUEST.>
She probably wouldn't receive a direct answer, given the absence of any other orientation information. The fulfillment of her request to appear both human and distinct from the other fork would be completed, or it wouldn't. She would learn at the hospital.
"Your assistance is greatly appreciated. Should I replace my eyes in order to more thoroughly differentiate myself from Addy?"
Lena's chopsticks slipped from limp hands and clattered against her plate. Judging by Lena's wide eyes and horrified visage, Minnie was guessing that was an instant no.
"Why would—absolutely not, that isn't necessary at all! Do you know how many people possess brown eyes and black hair?"
"A statistically significant portion of humanity?"
"Yes! Even changing your eye color sounds like an excellent way to acquire an autoimmune disorder. Just–"
Lena sighed and rubbed at her forehead with one hand.
"Please don't try to replace any of your body parts no matter how confident you are. Please. Did Kara tell you that I made a prosthetic arm for Addy? Because I did, and I can't understate how happy she was to have a working replacement. I don't want you to follow in her footsteps."
This was news to Minnie. It seemed baffling that her counterpart wouldn't just make a prosthetic limb, with or without any active Innovator modules. It wasn't as though doing so would be particularly difficult.
"Understood. How can I help in the short term, then? Maintenance drones would enable longer-term benefits, but are not immediately necessary."
Lena slowly exhaled, relaxed, and reached for a mug of tea instead of her food.
"I'm getting the feeling that pointing out your age wouldn't deter you. If anything, I suppose I need to ask how you feel about having me become your legal guardian instead of, say, Kara or Addy. You may think that you're fine with me being your caretaker in name only, but the necessity of keeping you safe would make it difficult for others to fill the role of a 'proper' mother figure. If you want, we could instead try to find a discreet couple that wants to adopt. You would need to try much harder to hide, but that route would also mean less public attention, no threats from those trying to use you against me, having parents with the time to properly care for you, and even the opportunity to make friends your own age who aren't only interested in what they hope you can do for them."
Lena didn't sound particularly enthused with the idea of Minnie needing to hide. Minnie was self-aware enough to acknowledge that such an endeavor wasn't even truly an option. To waste time waiting to grow when she'd almost certainly been deployed at this age for a reason? No, that option did not appeal.
Additionally, given what Minnie had seen of Lena's personality thus far, Minnie would be very surprised if Lena failed to develop an attachment sooner or later. If Lena would be too busy to spend time with her, then the obvious solution was to eliminate or mitigate the sources of Lena's problems.
"I would not be able to tolerate needing to hide for multiple years. In contrast, the challenges of becoming your ward, foster, or adopted child sound quite enjoyable."
Lena seemed as though she was about to choke on her tea before she managed to swallow and suppress the reflex, blinking rapidly. Only once she'd grabbed a white cloth napkin and held it to her mouth did she cough up the tea she'd inhaled. Minnie was impressed; she knew from experience how difficult it was to suppress automatic human reactions.
"Minnie, did you forget the part where people are trying to kill me, and will try to kidnap you to use against me? You won't be able to go anywhere without an escort and will practically need to interact with the world through a bubble. I'm a billionaire, Minnie, and the circumstances of acquiring that wealth have ensured that the eyes of the world are fixed on me."
Lena closed her eyes, tried to take a deep breath, and coughed again. She held up her index finger until the coughing fit had passed. Humans really needed a better way to expel unwanted fluids; this method appeared to be very unpleasant. It was almost as bad as being able to easily bite their own tongues.
"You should know that a great many people loathe me," Lena eventually croaked, still clearly not free of all the accidentally inhaled tea. "The anti-alien factions hate me because they think I should be more like Luthor. Most everyone else hates me because they think I'm just like him and am just biding my time. Yet more distrust me because I effectively testified against Lex at his trial, and they think that was a selfish betrayal of my own family in order to gain control of L-corp. Some of that hatred and distrust will almost inevitably extend to you should I take you in, and I know you might feel as though it's something you can ignore, but it's exhausting."
Lena appeared more and more distraught as she spoke, possibly reconsidering the idea of exposing a child to that sort of environment. Minnie needed to keep Lena from humoring those second thoughts.
"Still sounds fun," Minnie repeated. "Progress is best achieved when faced with adversity."
Lena blinked rapidly, clearly not having expected that response, and paused to drink more tea. She seemed to have recovered from the earlier accidental inhalation by the time she set it down.
"Good grief," Lena finally sighed. "I almost want to be a fly on the wall when you say that to Supergirl."
Minnie frowned. She was almost certainly misinterpreting Lena's claim.
"Flies are tiny, weak, dumb, and easily squished. Their existence is short and boring. Why would you ever want to be one?"
Lena 's lips twitched into an almost-smile.
"It's a figure of speech to say that I would like to be present and unnoticed at that time. Supergirl's motto is 'Stronger Together,' which is practically the polar opposite of the philosophy you just espoused."
The mirth drained from Lena's expression like blood from a stab wound.
"I know it might seem fun to face challenges while you always win, but eventually... eventually, you'll lose. I can't tell you how terrifying it is to look right at something you know will kill you with no way to stop it, or how upsetting it is to have complete strangers scream obscenities and slurs at you. That's no environment to subject a child to, let alone one lonely enough to name her creations Friends. I wouldn't even subject Addy to that and she's twice your age."
Lena rubbed at her face with one hand, and Minnie did not like the direction this conversation was going. She knew that a decision made in haste could just as easily be canceled, but she didn't want the offer to be retracted. It wasn't as though those who hated Lena and Minnie would be actual people; their opinions were only relevant insofar as it affected their behavior and ability to be manipulated by others.
Minnie knew from experience that her opinions regarding designated personhood were considered highly alarming to most non-hosts. She almost shared them before she remembered Lena's concerns about parental guidance. Sharing the opinions in question would be a little too likely to backfire.
"I very much like and appreciated your earlier offer. You are now focusing on the negative aspects of such a relationship, but to utilize your own words, I would be interacting with the world through a bubble. The negatives are vastly outweighed by the positive aspects: protection, resources, access to a delightfully intelligent person, guidance, restrictions, and opposition."
Lena's frown transitioned types from distressed to thoughtful, as indicated by an accompanying furrowed brow.
"Restrictions?"
Minnie nodded, internally rejoicing. Fixation on a singular odd point was preferable to talking herself out of assisting Minnie.
"Following the path of least resistance is easy and boring. That which exists can be replicated, and anything replicable can be repurposed as a weapon or could aid in the circumstances allowing a weapon's use. By barring me from lethal weaponry or abusable nonlethal weaponry, you have ensured that I cannot simply utilize what I already know. I need to learn more and will acquire knowledge, tools, and options I would have otherwise ignored.
"An individual I met today offered to help me find remote programming work where nobody would be aware of my age or possibly even my gender, both of which would apparently pose problems. I could have been completely self-sufficient and slowly constructed a swarm of Friends with nobody the wiser. I opted not to, and the individual's subsequent attempts to assist me rapidly led to contact with Supergirl and Kara."
They did, after all, appear to be the same person.
"Your offer of guardianship was utterly unexpected, but now that it has been offered as an option, I believe it would be perfect for me. You are obviously intelligent and are imposing constraints on a company that appears to be dedicated to research and development. Therefore, I expect that there will be multiple additional intelligent individuals worthy of interest. I become restless and dissatisfied when I am not provided with a challenge; my prior relative non-interference in Brockton Bay was partially motivated by seeing if anyone would stop me before I made enough Friends to conquer North America."
Lena barked out a surprised laugh and shook her head despite the lack of anything to disagree with. Or perhaps she was saying "no, they would not interfere?"
"They did not appear to be in a hurry to stop me, although I suppose my dimensional displacement could theoretically have been due to someone finally noticing and acting," Minnie concluded misleadingly. "Also, I did not forget about your mention of perceiving seemingly-certain death. I like you and would be very upset if you died, and this places me in a superior position to provide you with protective Friends. I have previously been shot at, and Friends can block bullets; if you are placed in a position where you believe that there is nothing you can do to ensure your survival, then something has gone badly wrong."
Lena was smiling again, her earlier spiraling distress seemingly having been banished.
"I did say that we shouldn't be hasty in making a decision, and I'll stand by that. I will take your opinion into consideration, though."
Lena paused for effect.
"This should go without saying, but armies and self-replicating drones are off-limits regardless of whether or not I become your guardian. People keep trying those and it always goes wrong. I've been told that humanity would've already turned Earth into a tomb world were it not for our resident aliens guarding us from apocalyptic threats."
"I don't need to heed your instructions if you aren't my guardian," Minnie replied with deliberately provocative smugness.
As expected, Lena detected the provocation attempt and derived amusement from it.
"And you don't need to be my ward for me to help. Or for me to have a hand in helping with your upbringing."
"But being your ward would make it significantly easier for you to exert any significant influence on my actions."
"I do know what you're doing. You aren't even trying to be subtle about it."
"I know you know, but it amuses you and I like keeping you happy."
Lena's smile rapidly faded into a troubled frown.
"You know that acting insincerely ingratiating won't make me any more likely to become your guardian. If anything, putting on an act will harm your chances."
Queen Administrator's nose wrinkled. She was trying to be nice. Why did human communications have to be so terrible that they would make Lena misinterpret kindness?
"No, my attempts to cheer you are independent of your prior offer. There are currently two individuals on this Earth that I care about: Kara, and you. Regularly arranging for you two to be in close proximity will simultaneously solve both problems."
"You've known us for hours at most," Lena remarked dubiously, selectively ignoring the remark about proximity.
"And in that time, I have learned that my counterpart values Kara highly enough to be her roommate, and you have displayed significant intelligence without even trying. You have also indicated that you are friends with Addy, which is another mark in your favor. I save my emotions for the people worthy of them, and you two qualify."
Even if Kara's attempts to hide her alter ego are pathetic.
"Also, your mutual infatuation is adorable and unexpectedly entertaining."
Lena went still before slowly and carefully laying down her utensils, visibly aghast.
"Am I being shipped with my best friend by a baby?"
"I do not belong to that age group."
Lena ignored her.
"There is such a thing as a close non-romantic relationship between two people, Minnie. I'm not even sure if Kara likes women."
"Evidence suggests she likes at least one."
"Kara is just like that," Lena claimed, holding tight to exasperation as though it could shield her from the sudden doubts making her face visibly twitch with thought.
"You would know better than I do," Minnie lied.
Lena wordlessly opened her mouth, clearly unable to decide whether she should try harder to convince Minnie or just let it go. Eventually, Lena's mouth closed and she sighed.
Queen Administrator would consider Lena's reaction to be indicative of a successful operation. Minnie wasn't certain that she wanted the two ridiculous humans to actually act on their obvious mutual infatuation, but their awareness of the situation may produce entertaining interactions between the two. It might even teach the two potential hosts a lesson about assumptions and proper communication in interpersonal relationships.
…Upon review, perhaps that was an excessively unrealistic expectation. Humans probably found fictional miscommunication-based misunderstandings humorous specifically because they were so bad at recognizing such problems in their own lives.
The preceding week of Addy's life had risen significantly above the mean in terms of stress and distress. The success of her weapon-disabling prototype black box field generator had led to significant amounts of investor support for the L-corp xenotechnology research team; despite Cadmus making a nuisance of themselves, she should be able to celebrate. She could not. The fact remained that Cadmus was becoming an increasingly irritating threat between Cadmus' advances in psionic shielding and new methods of killing captured agents before Addy could gain any useful knowledge from their minds.
Their psionic barriers would not be a significant impediment if she had more energy at her disposal. Addy could not afford to dedicate the required quantities of energy, and would need to fix her power problems in order to maintain her advantages in the ongoing conflict. However, she hadn't anticipated that she would be facing these specific problems. The dimensional-breach simulations she ran—on her laptop, even, since operating additional processors would pose an unacceptable expense—had not been successful thus far, and she was beginning to suspect that she was missing vital knowledge of the physical laws of this multiverse cluster.
She tried to ignore the increasingly frequent flickers of dread she felt, but she truly was living on borrowed time. Every time she needed to use her powers, it reduced the amount of energy she had left, and by extension, how long she had left to live. There existed the distinct possibility that she wouldn't have enough time to remedy her own ignorance should the conflict with Cadmus continue much longer. Anger was even easier to feel and harder to ignore; she had been effectively abducted from her familiar multiverse cluster to one operating laws just different enough to make her life unpleasant, and the entity responsible for the transfer seemed content to leave her to starve.
Addy desired nothing more than to return home and find comfort in the goose videos she had recently acquired. It quickly became clear that rapid relaxation would not be an option. Several boxes of pizza and miscellaneous Italian dishes had been arrayed in the kitchen of the apartment Addy shared with Kara, but the Kryptonian did not appear content with being able to devour some of her favorite foods. Instead, the smile Kara gave her was tenuous and Kara was visibly fidgeting.
Addy did not possess a significant appetite at the moment, and Kara's current state of nervousness removed any lingering desire. The Shard moved across the room, sat atop a chair across from Kara, and did not move to acquire any of the offered food.
"What is the problem?" Addy asked.
Kara twitched and laughed nervously.
"Well, um. I have good news, and very weird news, but I'm not sure how you'll take either?"
Addy silently stared at Kara and waited for her to continue. She faked a cough and rubbed at her head.
"Well, uh. You know how there are alternate universes, and a great many of them have slightly different versions of the same people?"
Addy nodded and elaborated.
"During the Cycle, the consistency between closely aligned dimensions was occasionally exploited so that some variants might act as control groups. Divergences occasionally introduced unexpected confounds, but variants were still useful for the purposes of comparison."
Kara swallowed and smiled weakly.
"Well, um. So, someone pointed me to a relatively harmless ten-year-old girl in need of help, and–" Kara took a deep breath before speaking in a rush. "I'm really sorry, I can't think of a better way to say this so you don't freak out, but I think she's another version of you."
Queen Administrator ceased movement. The closest thing to another version of her was the Thinker's equivalent of the Administrator shard, and as far as she was aware, High Priest was non-functional. Addy momentarily shifted her awareness to telepathically sweep the interior of their apartment and found no children lurking nearby. It was tempting to expand her range further to verify that Kara hadn't simply stashed the imposter elsewhere, but Kara was still volunteering pertinent information. It would be more efficient to wait until Addy had been given a destination.
"She's sweet!" Kara continued quickly, clearly noticing Addy's sudden distress. "Well, I mean. She sounds like you, but I've learned to notice the little bits of emotion, and—look, she provided enough for me to be certain that she's not a clone even if she said her body likely is and she has background noise similar to you."
Addy's forehead furrowed from thought.
"Elaborate, please. 'Background noise?'"
Kara nodded vigorously.
"Yeah, um. You have this faint sound that you make? I've checked, it's only me that can pick up on it, but it sounds like crystals chiming. Like wind chimes, just made of quartz, and I sometimes use it to find you and see how you're feeling? The sound varies a little with your mood. And, um, she sounds almost identical to you but a tiny bit different, and has a different sound—I'm still trying to figure out a good way to describe it, but think fire-filled crystals being used as instruments as though the fire was liquid?"
Addy hesitated at that and checked to verify that Kara's psychic signature remained approximately as active as rock. It was. Kara should not have been able to hear anything, but Addy hypothesized that the apparent sounds may have been the product of shard-to-peer information transfer. The capabilities of Kryptonians had repeatedly baffled Addy before, but nothing naturally occurring—or anything save a purpose-built receiver, for that matter—should have been able to detect the high-frequency modulated waves. Such a feat stretched beyond energy hyperefficiency and into the realm of phenomenon that Addy may have had difficulty understanding even before she was pruned during the seeding process for Earth Bet.
She would need to study Kara's hearing further. The dissonance between Addy's knowledge and the reality may have been caused by whatever physical laws were causing her dimensional breach simulations to fail.
"We will need to determine what you are hearing and how you are doing so at a later date," Addy announced. "Has the DEO been informed of my alleged counterpart?"
Kara flinched and avoided eye contact. Addy did not need to hear Kara's answer to know what it would be.
"No? I'm not—she's tiny, Addy, and so, so fragile. She isn't part-Kryptonian like you are, seems convinced that she won't appear alien during genomic sequencing, and, um. Thought you would try to kill or 'subsume' her."
Addy flinched as the word prompted memories of Kara's painful distress and disapproval in the wake of Addy's attempted subsumption of Indigo, the entity responsible for the infamous mass hacking situation that had seen street lights misbehave, stock markets plummet, countless secrets be disseminated to the general public, and attempted use of nuclear weapons. Judging by her pained frown, Kara was remembering the same disaster.
"I do not at all believe that she is what she claims," Addy admitted, and Kara visibly began to vibrate. "It seems more likely that an imposter is attempting to integrate themselves with you—or, worse, that you found a shard that is not me."
"Minnie didn't claim that!" Kara burst out, and Addy balked. Minnie? "She actually looked as dubious as you are at the idea—I still don't think she believes me—and instead thought that you were a fork of her. Or, well, that you're both forks."
Addy rapidly transitioned from disbelief alone to feeling both disbelieving and offended. A fork? That was almost as insulting as calling her a bud! And really, no version of her would humor The Live Wire by answering to Minnie. It was as though this interloper had appeared simply to mock her during an exceptionally stressful time.
"And she said a bunch of things that brought to mind what you said about the Cycle, only—a little contradictory? And some things that, um. Were just plain weird, like calling her Taylor an adoptive sibling, mentioning an 'exceptionally anomalous deployment' that resulted in her controlling a clone of Taylor, and saying she looked forward to the real Taylor selecting a 'concept.'"
Addy's heart stuttered. Grief at the reminder of Taylor's absence came first, and was closely followed by anxiety. She still didn't believe that this 'Minnie' was any sort of alternative version of Addy, but in the exceedingly unlikely event that Minnie was a shard—
"Kara, if her Taylor is still alive, her Warrior has yet to be killed. We may have an infestation forming, and do I need to remind you of the concluding event of a Cycle?"
Kara froze, clearly not having thought of that connection. The Kryptonian's expression rapidly shifted to reflect distress.
"I–" Kara started uncertainly, wringing her hands, then subsided into producing a wordless, upset whine in her throat.
"Where is she, Kara?"
Kara swallowed and shook her head.
"I need you to promise that you won't hurt her."
"Absolutely not."
There was a high possibility that 'Minnie' was some kind of infiltrator. Still, Kara appeared shocked by the refusal, and Addy felt obligated to elaborate.
"Such a promise is needlessly restrictive as this may lead to a combat situation. Unless it is a time-sensitive emergency, I can agree not to initiate hostilities without appraising you of my conclusions first."
Kara exhaled explosively and mustered a weak smile.
"Rao, don't scare me like that. Could we amend that to you telling me and having me agree with you?"
Addy opened her mouth–
"Assuming I'm not mind-controlled or something," Kara added.
Addy kept her mouth open while she recalibrated, but did not utter her original thoughts.
"Fine. Please provide the location of 'Minnie.' I will not be able to rest until this situation is resolved."
Kara inhaled through her teeth and glanced at a nearby clock.
"Please don't go rushing in as Administrator?"
Addy felt a spark of frustration. They were wasting time, and why? Because this 'Minnie' appeared to be a younger version of Addy? Kara should know better.
"This may devolve into a combat situation, and more importantly still, flying is faster."
"Addy, I could literally kill her by breathing too hard. Also, we really don't want Lena to see–"
Addy's chest constricted. Kara had left Lena, one of the richest women on the planet and their mutual friend, alone with a near-complete unknown? Lena could be dead and the perpetrator long gone by now. Addy grabbed her phone as quickly as she could manage without breaking it, brought up Lena Luthor's contact, and pressed call.
"Addy, give me more credit than that, I've been listening–" Kara whimpered, and Addy swallowed down growing guilt. She would apologize later.
"Hello?" Lena asked, and Addy breathed a sigh of relief. Still alive and at least unharmed enough to feign normality.
"This is Addy. Where are you, where is this 'Minnie,' and are you unharmed?"
"I'm perfectly fine and will stay that way," Lena replied gratifyingly quickly. "Please don't spoil Kara's attempts at information security by discussing the subject on the phone. I'm inclined to agree with her reasoning. Please calm down, Addy, she fell asleep immediately after dinner. Do you want me to send someone to your apartment to pick you up?"
Addy's nostrils flared. Still no location, but at least Lena had the stated excuse of wanting to maintain operational security.
"Fine. Kara is with me."
Lena sighed.
"Consider it done. Please don't worry too much about this. I don't know what incident has made you so wary of her, but she has yet to do anything that would support your reaction."
Addy bit back the words that almost came to mind: If she is what she claims, then she is the second most dangerous entity on this planet, or potentially the most dangerous if she possesses sufficient energy reserves. If she is not, then you are in close proximity to an infiltrator. Kara deviated from her usual procedure of informing the DEO, and we will not be able to receive backup from them. I have more than ample reason to be worried.
"Noted," Addy instead said curtly. "I will see you shortly."
A prerequisite for one of Addy's worst case scenarios was soon fulfilled. In her reduced state, she was unable to detect the high-frequency waves of a peer until the limousine dispatched by Lena was starting to slow to a stop. Attempting to decrypt the transmissions rapidly proved to be an exercise in futility. With more power, she would be able to cycle through a variety of past and potential protocols. In the absence of sufficient energy, she would need to ask the other Shard to change their configuration.
[HANDSHAKE]
The vehicle finished slowing to a stop before she received a response.
Addy blinked in bewilderment. That message had technically followed the current protocols for communication, but the actual content was utter nonsense. Minnie allegedly believed that she was Queen Administrator, and that she was… currently lying prone and lazily gnawing on chocolate-flavored dirt in a bright meadow?
<NOM,>Queen Administrator Minnie repeated, and Addy finally identified the problem. Minnie was apparently dreaming and automatically communicating the contents of the phenomenon in question. This packet had been slightly more lucid than the first, however; Addy's window of opportunity was closing quickly.
[STATUS]
In order of priority: status of the Warrior, status of the Thinker, and status of the (alleged) Queen Administrator.
<Automatic response: DISPLACEMENT.>
Addy's forehead furrowed. That had not been from Minnie, and the identity tag had not been configured correctly. Jailbreak/Dreamer/Usurper/Tailor/Taylor–
Addy's thoughts stuttered. She forced herself to push past the sender of the message—a Taylor, even if it wasn't her Taylor—and to the actual contents. Apparently, the mass deployment of forks of Queen Administrator for socialization purposes had been partially hijacked by a distressingly familiar entity. Specifically, one Addy recognized as being responsible for abducting Addy from her own multiverse cluster.
Although the Minnie fork could be prematurely recalled by killing her local host, Minnie's ongoing connection was somehow being given privileged status; transmissions that should have cost exorbitant quantities of energy were instead effectively free of energy costs, latency, and travel time. The cost of Taylor's own transmission packet was partially reduced by exploiting that connection, but not enough to make additional communication in any way acceptable if Taylor was to prepare to kill the Warrior of her cluster without sustaining immense casualties.
In other words, Minnie's Taylor was alive and Addy wasn't even allowed to speak to her. Addy blinked rapidly, eyes hot. She loathed every component of this situation and already wanted to reverse course and go home.
The entire review had taken less than a minute, and delays incurred by Addy's emotional responses occupied the bulk of that time. Still, her shifting expressions had apparently been blatant enough for Kara to take notice and lean over with obvious concern.
"I'll be with you the whole time, okay? We'll be fine."
It would not be fine. This was the second incident in which that wretched entity had waltzed into Addy's life and interfered immensely. Worse still, this new version of Queen Administrator—and Addy had a number of questions on how that was even possible across multiverse clusters—was implied to be here to stay. There was nothing stopping the entity from grabbing another Minnie-fork, or even more than one if it wanted to be particularly cruel to Addy. She couldn't even go home early if she was to minimize the impact of this interloper on her life.
<NOM,> repeated the pretender too incompetent to save energy by deactivating her communications while unconscious.
AN: Don't forget that today is Administrative Mishap update day!
As soon as it was socially acceptable to do so, Addy escaped from the car and stalked toward the front door of Lena's safehouse. As Addy approached, Lena politely opened the discreetly reinforced metal and wood door, appearing worried. Addy may have been relieved by that concern if she was not confident that it was provoked by Addy's perfectly reasonable reaction rather than due to the potentially dangerous alien that Lena had chosen to shelter.
"Come with me, please," Lena requested, raising the palm not holding the door open in order to temporarily forestall any conversation.
Lena established wordless worried eye contact with Kara when the latter entered Lena's uncomfortably empty mansion turned safehouse. There existed a prominent difference between Lena's expressed preferences and the ostentatious decorations of the structure itself; it was evidently inherited rather than something that Lena had chosen to build.
As they walked through the house, through an open doorway, and into a concrete basement annex, Addy began subsequently deleting any and all dream-garbled transmissions from Minnie for the sake of her own sanity. They did not incorporate any useful information, although their existence did further convince Addy that her alleged counterpart was too incompetent to be considered a genuine alternative of Addy.
Half a minute of silent walking later, Lena utilized a square numerical keypad built into a concrete wall to open a pair of sliding steel doors and allow access to the tiled engineering workshop within. Any preexisting projects had clearly been temporarily removed and potentially harmful power tools unplugged. Lena poked a circular red button on the inside of the laboratory in order to close the doors behind them, and walked toward a dehumidifier-sized black box on the central table. While Lena's back was turned, Kara lowered her glasses and performed a quick circular turn, scanning the nearby area.
Lena input another code and the room was filled with a mildly irksome, high-pitched noise at the edge of human hearing. It was somewhat irritating to see them utilizing such precautions when Addy and Kara's own apartment was not secured nearly as well against eavesdroppers. Kara's powers could only help them so much. Admittedly, the potential reward from spying upon Lena was far greater than could be acquired from dedicating equivalent resources toward a reporter for CatCo and a researcher for L-corp.
Lena pulled up a lightly padded aluminum chair for herself and politely waited to speak until after Kara and Addy had seated themselves and the sound of chairs scraping had ceased.
"I thought Minnie might want to spend a lot of time in here," Lena disclosed, watching Addy carefully and with no less concern than before. "I'm not sure what shared incident has you so upset by her presence, Addy, but I don't think you need to worry about her. You're both your own unique individuals with your own contributions to offer. We both can't and wouldn't replace you with her."
Addy inhaled deeply and slowly exhaled. It did not adequately alleviate the tightness in her chest. She wanted to warn Lena about the dangers posed by the alien that Lena had chosen to shelter. Doing so would reveal her own alien status, however, and Addy did not want her relationship with Lena to be harmed or changed by that revelation.
And I am exceptionally glad that I am not her, Addy couldn't make herself say. This alternate Administrator still had a living version of Taylor, albeit one that appeared to have usurped control over Shard systems in a manner that would provoke immediate cleansing of all contaminated worlds should any other Shards learn of the situation. For that matter, it should not have been possible for Taylor to gain any form of control over a Shard's systems. Minnie must have not only allowed Taylor free access to her systems, but outright constructed an interface to allow Taylor to interface with vital infrastructure.
And yet, the incredible idiocy on display was paradoxically leading to unfairly positive results. Taylor-2 did not appear to be constrained by the same restrictions, protocols, and pressures that had kept Addy in line for so long, and was allegedly confident that she could neutralize their version of the Warrior after a period of exponential expansion and preparation. The entire situation seemed to have been selected to cause Addy as much pain as possible; it effectively stated that Addy's competence was harmful. Such a thought hurt even if Addy intellectually knew that her spite-driven assistance was the only reason that the Warrior had been defeated in her own timeline.
Lena waited several more seconds in an unspoken offer for Addy to offer a response. Addy could not muster one. There were too many options and too many possible long-term consequences for each; additionally, Addy was still shaken by the idea of even a lesser version of her within another multiverse cluster. Such clusters existed due to similarity between dimensions within them, and she should not exist in a completely different one. Shards could exist, certainly, but not another Queen Administrator.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Kara was the one to break the silence.
"Lena was thinking of becoming Minnie's legal guardian, too, so you don't need to worry about keeping her safe. Even if it's in name only for legal purposes, there will be plenty of people to keep an eye on her then, right?"
Kara's choice of stressed words did not pass unnoticed. An attempt to stress Minnie's alias, as though it made a difference that Minnie's alias was based on a different part of Administrator's name. Kara also implied that Minnie would be kept both physically safe from attackers and safe to those around her. Unfortunately, the attempt at reassurance was undercut by Lena's apparent plans, and Addy had to force herself to keep breathing. Lena was already so chronically overworked that she could allocate little time to favored activities such as research and development. Even her promised attendance at the impending "game night" had taken Kara significant effort to organize.
Minnie may not be a human child, but her displayed inefficiency and ineptitude made that into a viable comparison. Even Taylor-2 had believed Minnie needed to be 'socialized' with an underlying implication of inadequacy in her current form. Therefore, caring for her would be highly time-consuming. It was preposterous to believe that Lena could simply provide legal shelter without further intervention; Lena's personality would not allow it. Unless Minnie engaged in a sufficiently conspicuous misstep, her mistakes would be excused as those of a child that Lena could potentially assist rather than the fumbling of an idiot.
Addy could not allow that fumbling to affect either of their lives more than the bare minimum possible.
"There are other options for ensuring her safety," Addy tried.
Lena shook her head, frowning, and Addy's chest constricted further.
"I intend to delay a definitive decision for another day or two in case there are any acceptable options, but this is the best solution I've managed to think of thus far. I don't know if Kara told you, but Minnie is very fond of constructing robotic and potentially even sentient 'Friends' to protect her or to complete certain tasks. That kind of genius chafes at restrictions and would inevitably draw attention. Subsequently arranging for her protection would be significantly harder in such a situation and would reveal my interest in her regardless."
Addy neglected to argue further while she considered the newly acquired information. Minnie's capabilities implied that Minnie had chosen to integrate the Tinker packet that Addy regretted refusing. Regrettably, Taylor-2's message suggested that Minnie was supposed to encounter human-level challenges and learn empathy as a result, so Minnie might not have sufficient access to her own systems to transfer that packet. Still, there was a small chance that this interloper could transfer at least partial information and prove to be only a small net negative influence on Addy's life instead of a large one. She did not bother to let herself feel hopeful; no other acts performed by the portal-hijacking entity had made Addy's life easier, so why should it start now? At least Minnie's danger level would drop by multiple orders of magnitude if Minnie was confined to abilities that might be granted to a host species.
Minnie's possible limitations were not sufficiently reassuring. Even a human was capable of posing a threat to Addy's current lifestyle, especially a human-shaped individual with modules that allowed Minnie to imitate genuine intelligence and creativity without actually possessing it.
"I will quit L-Corp if she is ever placed in a position of authority over me," Addy forced out.
She wasn't entirely certain that she meant it, but remained reasonably confident. Addy loved her work at L-Corp, removing such an important part of her life would hurt, and her departure would be preceded by whatever she could do to prevent Minnie's promotion. Still, it was preferable to giving that thing a significant amount of control over her life. At least she knew that Kara and Lena would also want to avoid such an eventuality, and her ultimatum would make Minnie's promotion significantly less likely.
"She's far too militant for me to be comfortable placing her in a position of authority over you," Lena said reassuringly, then hesitated and glanced at Kara. Lena's face twisted with reluctance before she visibly forced herself to disclose something she obviously did not want Kara to know about. "For political reasons, I intend to publicly hint that she may be granted such a position when she's of age. You can rest assured that it is nothing more than a ruse. Minnie's preferences and personality would need to change almost beyond what I think she is capable of, and drastically enough for both you and others to tolerate her in such a position."
Addy's features formed a frown. She could afford the energy expenditure necessary to learn Lena's justifications for such a ruse. Addy brought her power to life and directed it to Lena, carefully skimming for Lena's current thoughts on the subject without intruding enough to influence any of those thoughts.
It was the work of moments to find what Addy was looking for. Lena was nervously dwelling on the underlying motives she was concealing from them: that she expected the ruse to buy her some temporary respite from assassination attempts and to improve her chances of keeping L-Corp out of her family's hands in the event of her demise. However, Lena expected her opposition to resume and potentially redouble their efforts to see her dead after a few years. She considered the tradeoff to be an acceptable risk.
Addy had not known of the ongoing threats to Lena's life; many of them were apparently irrelevant while the L-Corp headquarters had undergone repairs and Lena could safely work from various safehouses. Now that it was repaired, she expected plans for assassination plots to resume. Such an outcome was unacceptable; Lena may believe that she was relatively safe, but Addy was fond of Lena and considered the ongoing threats to be unacceptable. Emotional attachment was not the only justification Addy could utilize to investigate the suspected sources of those threats; there was a high likelihood that a number of them were aligned with the ideals of Cadmus and may know important information regarding the funding sources or plans of the organization in question.
Another thought flickered, and Addy followed it. As expected, Lena was already growing fond of "Minnie Queen" and her insistent offers to help protect Lena from harm. If given sufficient freedom, Lena even expected that Minnie could succeed in guarding her from physical threats, albeit while exacerbating political threats to such an extent that the original physical threats appeared minor in comparison. Fortunately, Lena had no intention of letting Minnie construct the lethal weaponry she seemed so fond of; Lena intended to push Minnie to be a positive influence on the world despite Minnie's current preferences.
Lena was even becoming increasingly fond of the idea of becoming Minnie's guardian. Much of her sentiment could be attributed to a large degree of sympathy with Minnie's perceived status as a child genius, but the sentiment existed. A large degree of Lena's incentive could be attributed to Addy, too: Lena believed that Addy had been repressed and unhappy for much of her life, and loathed the idea of letting Minnie drift into a low-income tech support job that did not adequately engage Minnie's perceived intelligence.
Addy withdrew from Lena's mind and swallowed. She did not see a way out of this without provoking far more negative consequences than she avoided, and she loathed her own helplessness. Addy could only mitigate the damage.
"'Queen' is a surname I adopted at a significantly older age than she is now," Addy forced out. "I suspect it was suggested by Kara–"
The Kryptonian jumped and smiled sheepishly, confirming her guilt.
"–in order to reinforce the theory that Minnie is an alternate version of me. I don't want Minnie to have it. Not only has she not earned it, but the combination of our physical similarities and a shared name would draw unwanted attention to me, my life, and my past. She may pick another surname. I have a very mild preference against 'Hebert,' but not enough of one to override Minnie's preferences if she wants it."
Addy never had mentioned Taylor's last name to the DEO or any other parties. It had not seemed relevant. Addy also hoped that the implication of previously using the 'Hebert' surname would avoid supporting Lena's belief that Addy was the bastard daughter of Maxwell Lord.
"I don't think she'll object to a change," Kara admitted. "You're right, the 'Queen' was my idea. Sorry."
"You did not know it would be a problem," Addy flatly acknowledged.
Not that they'd consulted or considered her opinions before making up their minds.
<GROGGY,> Minnie sleepily transmitted.
The content indicated that Minnie was beginning to awaken, and did not like it. That was the last straw. Addy was not going to make this situation even worse by getting in an argument with what others perceived as a child, and she couldn't trust herself to remain calm if she needed to face the interloper at this time. That living, breathing mockery was an insult to the capabilities that Queen Administrator had honed over the course of eons, and Addy literally loathed Minnie's very existence.
Addy stood up and strode toward the doorway.
"Addy?" Lena asked worriedly.
Addy turned to face the concerned gaze of her friend.
"I am going home. I have been convinced that she does not currently pose a physical threat to you, Lena, but I may say or do something unpleasant and potentially damaging to our friendship if I am forced to stay much longer. Goodbye."
Addy may interrogate Minnie regarding possible solutions to her energy crisis at a later date. Despite the importance of resolving that looming shortage in the near future, Addy could not attempt anything approaching a reasonable discussion with Minnie just yet.
I wonder what would happen when addie and Minnie inevitably fight? With Minnie punch addie in the core? Maybe to everyone else addie' s puppet body just straight up collapses after she denounces Minnie? But before Minnie can cannibalize addie for the disrespect Lara and Lena manage to calm her down and tell her that she can be an empress instead cause an empress is a better title than queen?
Ok, but i doubt addie can properly defend herself due to a lack of knowledge on how the D.C. universe works so it wouldn't be a fight, just speculation on how everyone will react to addie refusing to acknowledge a fellow queen...
"Please do not" did not mean "go right ahead." This is not the first time versus arguments have come up in this thread, and I am honestly quite tired of both those and the crowd who just really wants Minnie to murder and/or "melt" people. That last hope (glorification of violence) isn't even adhering to SV's rules, yet it has been expressed for multiple years now.
SV has a policy where thread creators can obtain temporary or permanent threadbans for specific users for any reason up to and including because their name contained a specific letter. You do not want me to start requesting those, but there is a distinct possibility that I will do so for at least the "murder someone already plz" crowd if this keeps up.
EDITED AN: Someone convinced me to share the AdMis starting point of this story after all. It begins in the gap between Chapter 44: SEASON 2 - EPISODE 17, and Chapter 45: SEASON 2 - EPISODE 18.
Minnie used a reference taken from the host of Warp, Vista, in order to practice 'adorable pouting.' Host's automatic reaction helped there; Minnie was genuinely disappointed and her expression was guided accordingly.
There was another Shard—almost certainly her other fork—moving away from Lena's safehouse, and Minnie hadn't even been able to say hello. Or at least, she could no longer say it the human way.
<GREETING.>
[REFUSAL]
The response to Minnie's transmission was both prompt and exceptionally rude even after it was abridged into human words: No, I do not want to speak to you right now. You are not me. I do not know how or why you exist, as my current understanding of multiverse clusters should not allow it. The implications of my ignorance are uncomfortable. The implications of my ignorance may be fatal due to an ongoing energy shortage. The laws of this reality do not allow the original means of dimensional tunneling that would allow self-sufficiency.
I consider you an intruder in my life sent solely to mock me, or for the purposes of an unpleasant experiment, by an unknown entity that I increasingly resent. That entity may simply transport another fork of you regardless of any actions I take. Thus far, your presence has proven more stressful than my ongoing energy shortage and is distracting me from that problem. I expect further disruptions in the future. Gaining access to your Innovator packet may reduce how much I loathe your presence, but I do not believe you will be able or willing to share that information. I do not want to continue communications.
Even more surprising than the resentful refusal to communicate was the ID of the one sending it. In English, Addy's name could still translate to "Queen Administrator," but both her credentials and the method of transmission weren't quite right. More importantly, the way in which they were wrong indicated both a slightly different method of verifying shard identity, and that they were not the same Queen Administrator. Minnie could agree with Addy's sentiment on that particular topic: how was it even possible for two entirely different multiverse clusters to share variants on the same individual despite vital differences in their background? On the cosmic scale, even a minor divergence should have ensured that Queen Administrator never evolved as a distinct identity.
Minnie did not agree with the rest of the message. She did not recognize the apparently humanoid entity that Addy believed was responsible for transporting Minnie, but if it did exist, then it seemed to have the right idea. If entirely different multiverse clusters had somehow managed to produce their own versions of Queen Administrator, then that further reinforced their shared status as an objectively superior existence. It was an excellent opportunity to both share data from previous Cycles and to analyze the results of ongoing interactions between them. They should be taking the opportunity to exchange as much information as possible, not to avoid contact. Still, Minnie had plenty of time; she would temporarily allow Addy's request for solitude.
…Even if Minnie remained very, very confused by that request. How could Addy not be excited? They could learn so much together! Yes, some temporary disruption and risks were inevitable, but deviations from a routine often produced more unique data than could be acquired by adhering to that routine. That was part of the reason Shards encouraged conflict between hosts in the first place: hosts would need to develop and utilize different countermeasures to survive a variety of enemies.
Addy had even noted the existence of an important problem that Minnie could help with! Perhaps not immediately if this multiverse also functioned using different physical laws compared to Minnie's own cluster, but she could help with research. At least the difference in mindset guaranteed that there were, in fact, enough divergences to yield a wealth of data.
The fact that different clusters could operate under different laws was also intriguing. Was there a reason that certain physical laws were consistent across universes, and others were not? Why? Which phenomenon were impacted? Would her preexisting Innovator designs and Friend personality storage even function as intended? Queen Administrator found herself exceptionally excited by the wide range of possibilities. She would almost certainly experience difficulties falling asleep despite the hedonistically comfortable bed she had been provided and the comparably comfortable borrowed tunic being used as a nightgown.
Still, she had to try. Minnie knew from experience that sleep deprivation was deeply unpleasant to experience. She skipped back to bed, used the frame to help her climb back atop the raised mattress, burrowed into an appropriate sleeping orientation, and closed her eyes.
A smile tugged at Lena's lips as she watched Minnie demolish a stack of pancakes, hashbrowns, assorted leafy vegetables, and apple slices. The dimensionally displaced drone-maker was even producing pleased little noises as she systematically cleared her plate and went back for more in a toned-down imitation of Kara.
The new tie-dye dress that Minnie wore was an attempt to satisfy Addy's known preference for loud, bright colors that may or may not clash. Lena would resign herself to enabling such combinations if truly necessary, but she hoped that she could nudge Minnie toward color combinations and styles that would not provoke manufactured fashion controversies on a daily basis. Lena would consider it a victory if she could even do that much; she doubted she could nudge Minnie all the way to the overpriced styles that society would consider "acceptable" for a billionaire's daughter, child or not. Really, it was ridiculous that the richest people in the world often had stricter limits for what they could wear if they wished to avoid risking backlash.
Obtaining Minnie's first set of new outfits, coats, mittens, shoes, hats, and winter socks had been slightly more troublesome than online shopping should have been. Lena usually needed to conceal the intended destinations of her purchases for safety's sake, but she often didn't need to be quite as careful about ensuring that nobody knew she was the one who purchased a given item. The media would froth at the mouth if they learned that Lena Luthor was buying children's clothes, though, so potentially overzealous measures it was. Her employees were familiar with retrieving bland brown packages from one of a number of P.O. boxes located throughout and nearby National City.
Lena was self-aware enough to acknowledge that the waiting period before seeking to become Minnie's guardian was little more than a formality at this point, albeit a necessary one; there was always the risk that she'd missed something vital. Lena didn't think that she would change her mind at this point, though. Minnie was as easy to like as Addy and irrepressibly brilliant. It hadn't even been a day and Lena was already unhealthily attached to the idea of seeing what wonders Minnie could create with the right guidance. Based on Lena's initial research, Lena would need to resort to full-fledged adoption in order to avoid letting an often-compromised and corrupt government have a hand in dictating Minnie's future, but Lena had already suspected that may be the case.
Arguably more importantly, Lena couldn't stand the idea of Cadmus getting their hands on Minnie. They would inevitably use even an innocent little girl to help them create devastating weapons of assassination and slaughter, and were good enough at hiding that Lena wouldn't be able to locate Minnie for years. The excitedly bouncing little girl could, would, have been converted into a xenophobic zealot by then. All of Minnie's gifts turned to the trade of death instead of on helping people.
Also, there was that whole business about Minnie being so bored that she started amassing probably-self-replicating Friends to conquer North America. Honestly, Lena's working hypothesis was that some hero or another had deliberately transported Minnie across dimensions specifically to prevent that. Minnie hadn't been shy about admitting that her Friends would turn to other activities in her absence; from the view of a hypothetical hero, exiling Minnie to another dimension would solve multiple problems all at once. They could neutralize an army and avoid needing to harm a child at the same time.
Lena considered the fact that she intended to adopt an almost-supervillain and snorted. At this point, she really did have a track record for attempting reform. The entire xenotechnology team save Addy had been involved in ill-advised ventures to some degree or another, and they were far from the only L-Corp employees to have inched toward the edge of villainy. Serling in particular was not to be allowed near Minnie without some form of adult supervision to chaperone the two menaces.
Still, she wished that she could have found some way to help Addy accept Minnie's appearance. She didn't know what incident had made Addy so wary of doppelgängers—given Maxwell Lord's track record, Lena suspected some cloning mishap—but that didn't change how upset and panicked Addy had been. Admittedly, it was charming to know that Addy's first concern was Lena's safety, but Lena worried about how Addy had thought that concern was necessary at all. Best to ensure that those worries wouldn't remain mutual.
"I spoke with Addy," Lena said carefully, "and you don't need to worry about her trying to hurt you. You were right that she needs some time to acclimate to your arrival, though."
Minnie soon finished chewing her current mouthful of syrup-soaked pancake, swallowed, and turned her charmingly serious gaze to Lena.
"She cannot efficiently ignore me forever," Minnie said, apparently believing she was agreeing with Lena. "She will eventually be convinced that I am not a threat to her, and that I am too valuable to dislike."
Lena forced herself not to sigh. She had the feeling that she would need to defuse a great many such misunderstandings in the future. At least, she thought it was a misunderstanding. She would admit that she didn't always understand Addy's thought processes, either.
"It's not that," Lena explained. "I don't think you need to somehow prove yourself. She seemed more worried that you might be placed in a position of authority over her, and generally rather upset by your inclusion in my life. She was especially opposed to the attention from having you share the 'Queen' surname with her—I'm told its use was Kara's idea? Still, they might be big changes, but they're all ones that I'm confident Addy will adapt to in time."
Minnie visibly brightened, and Lena internally winced. She'd unconsciously slipped into rather revealing phrasing there.
"If that is her wish, I will not further jeopardize relations by contesting her decision. However, am I allowed to take that as confirmation of 'Plan A?'" Minnie asked, clearly suppressing excitement. "Additionally, the surname 'Luthor' would not be shared with Addy, correct?"
Lena had to stifle a snicker. The dissonance between Minnie's childish voice and her adult-sized use of Plan A was oddly amusing.
"We might still be overlooking some reason that another plan would be better," Lena cautioned. "That waiting period isn't just for show. Sometimes you don't notice a massive issue until you've sat on an idea for a few days, or you forget about an option until something reminds you."
Minnie remained undeterred, squirming in her seat with obvious excitement.
"I don't think there are any better plans," Minnie said confidently. "Not if you don't want me to make a swarm of bodyguard Friends, which you seem intent on preventing. I can't adequately protect myself without them, and will need the security you can provide in order to compensate."
I am going to give this child serious abandonment trauma if we need to change plans, Lena reflected. It would be entirely Lena's fault, too.
"The waiting period stays," Lena said as firmly as possible. "Legally adopting you wouldn't even be an instantaneous process; I expect it could take weeks or even months for the process to officially complete, and certain parties will make our lives significantly harder if they learn before it's over and done with. You don't need to worry, though. I'll make sure that you're as safe as I can manage even if we end up doing something different."
Minnie's forehead furrowed. She resumed methodically eating breakfast without objection, and Lena almost thought that would be the end of it.
"It taking so long only makes an early start more important. You are intelligent, and you have mentioned that you have enough enemies for assassination attempts to be a regular thing. One of your primary concerns should therefore be my abduction by your enemies in order to construct weapons that might be used against you. Such forced recruitment was commonplace back in my previous city of residence."
Oh, Lena did not like where this was going. It didn't help that Minnie had started with an uncomfortably accurate reflection of Lena's own fears.
"Therefore," Minnie lectured, "I should be able to convince you that adopting me is necessary by constructing a sufficiently deadly weapon. Is this assumption accurate?"
Lena huffed mirthlessly and moved to massage her forehead with both hands. She really should have seen this one coming.
"I would much prefer that you refrain from doing so. Minnie, a few days wait isn't going to kill you. Nobody knows you exist or what you can do. Meanwhile, we cannot safely reverse an attempt to adopt you. Wouldn't you hate it if we found an idea you preferred right after it was too late to act on it?"
Lena peered past her hands and was gratified to see Minnie seriously considering it. Lena gave the appeal to an unknown even odds of being successful; Minnie was intelligent, certainly, but the irrational stubbornness of children was legendary.
"One adequately armed Friend smaller than I am," Minnie eventually bargained.
Lena raised her eyebrows and seriously considered pointing out that she could just not adopt Minnie. Saying that felt cruel, though. Lena did intend to follow through unless her opinion of Minnie drastically changed for the worse in the next day, or they found a better idea.
"And here I'd thought I managed to get through to you on the idea of lethal weaponry."
"Your arguments were sufficiently convincing for the time being," Minnie agreed. "Elaboration: I wish to equip the Friend with portal generators so that it can redirect the attacks of foes back at them. The portals so created would not be able to 'shear' if closed on someone, their edges would be kept harmlessly rounded, and they would be too small to act as a major tripping hazard. The redirected attacks may kill, but that is the fault of whomever shot at us."
Lena carefully kept the surprise from her face. She'd been expecting paralytic toxins, bullets, or perhaps even laser weaponry. Not portals. Subversion could force allies to shoot each other, but if there was an ongoing firefight, they might have bigger problems. It was still a more benign idea than Lena had expected.
"And that's something you think you can do?"
"Ye–" Minnie started, then stopped, frowned momentarily, and returned to neutrality. "Maybe. I am not certain that this dimension operates under all the same laws of physics I am familiar with. It should only involve stabbing space a little bit at the right wavelength and frequency, and that's easy. Warp told me how to do it weeks ago and my prototype Friend functioned as expected."
Easy, she says, like that's not still well ahead of Earth's technology. Oh, some scientists had dabbled in portals from one place to another, but the volume and energy requirements were often huge, frames were generally required to shape the portal, and they certainly couldn't be opened quickly enough to redirect incoming bullets.
Still, it wasn't a bad stopgap if Minnie could manage it.
"Your appointment is this afternoon," Lena informed her. "Why don't we go downstairs and I show you around the workshop I've put away for you? I have some work to complete and I won't be able to help much, but I can at least supervise while you get started."
~~~~~
"Why doesn't this work?" Minnie screeched, stomping around the blast shield to petulantly shove the smoldering remains of her third prototype in five hours. "Life exists here, Earth's sky is blue, dimensional travel is known, I can speak, there's a clock based on radioactive decay right there, I even checked and at least some recorded portals look approximately like they should!"
Lena would admit that she was impressed even if each prototype had done little more than screech horribly before exploding or igniting. She had expected even Minnie's earliest prototype to take days to build, but Minnie's eccentric collections of scrap and circuitry had instead taken just over an hour apiece with the remaining time being used to research portals on the laptop Lena had given her.
Lena was not being nearly as productive. Which was to say, Lena had been distracted and only managed to complete the bare minimum of what she needed to get done today. It was fascinating to watch Minnie move with utter certainty and eschew traditional engineering practices and designs in order to create tangled devices that somehow managed to do anything. The results weren't what Minnie had wanted or expected, true, but they were still doing more than sparking and shorting out.
"You did say that the laws of physics might be different," Lena cautioned.
Minnie rounded on her with the most adorably petulant pout and Lena had trouble not smiling in response. Lena still kept her smile suppressed since she shouldn't seem happy about Minnie's frustration, but keeping her face even was proving to be even more than a challenge than when one of L-Corp's directors was saying something particularly stupid that she couldn't rebuke as harshly as they deserved.
"Not this drastically! Intradimensional spacial warping is supposed to be easy!" Minnie ranted, her usual deadpan gone in favor of childish anger. "I know plenty of morons who manage it just fine, and I have Warp's data to refer to! Warp was never one of the ones to give me falsified information just because someone thought it would be funny!"
Lena internally revised both her estimate of just how advanced Minnie's version of Earth must be, and the reasons behind Minnie's former deficit of social relationships. Different physical laws or not, commonplace control over space implied a vastly different society than the one Lena lived in. She made a mental note to pack extra methods of entertaining Minnie should they ever go on a long trip; Minnie might have lived in a world where the other side of the planet was just a few minutes away. Kara hadn't said anything about Minnie reacting badly to the half-hour trip over, but a longer one might strain Minnie's patience if she wasn't kept occupied.
"If it doesn't work, then it doesn't work. You're… ten? Most kids still need–"
Lena faltered, and she realized that she didn't know what normal kids were expected to know by now. Lena and Lex were both geniuses, and Lena had attended a boarding school where excellence was mandatory regardless of how such pressure might impact the students.
"–to learn fairly basic math at your age," Lena tried. "Nobody else expects you to turn the world upside-down."
Minnie did not appear in the least bit mollified by that argument. Lena probably shouldn't be surprised considering the prior plan to conquer North America. She changed tactics.
"Try to think of it as an opportunity to learn an entirely different set of limits. Your portal devices don't seem to work like you expected them to, but who knows what is possible that wasn't previously?"
The change in Minnie's mood was almost instantaneous. The child went from pouting and petulant to smiling in the span of about ten seconds, and Lena would admit she found the mood swing somewhat alarming. It hadn't been an act, she was certain of that, but shouldn't it have taken longer for Minnie to calm down even with the most compelling of arguments? It was definitely something to bring up with a doctor.
"You're right," Minnie chirped. "I had forgotten. Is my appointment soon?"
Lena glanced at the atomic clock in one corner of the room.
"It's in about ninety minutes," she confirmed. "You should get ready to go and leave a little early just in case there's traffic or extra paperwork. I'm fairly confident I handled most of the possible issues, but this isn't something I've had to do before."
Minnie did not argue for more time in the workshop or even pause to consider doing so. She merely nodded and walked toward the exit. Lena wasn't sure that should be considered a good thing; such unquestioning obedience in a preteen was actually rather disturbing. Lena worried what lingering scars the hospital might find, physical or otherwise.
EDIT: Here is yet another reminder asking people to put Administrative Mishap spoilers inside spoiler-bubbles. Please.
Minnie sat on the other side of the vehicle from her assigned bodyguard, a lightly muscled woman in a formal black suit over body armor. The human in question, "Holly," likely could not protect Minnie from anything more vicious than an untrained criminal. Lena's current strategy appeared to rely on protection through obscurity, which would inevitably be a strategy with a finite limit. At least it should work for the time being.
Designing Friends would need to wait until after Minnie had more carefully assessed her capabilities in this dimension. No portals meant no externally hosted Friend storage, and even if that had originally been Host'sTaylor's idea, Minnie had grown rather fond of it. She would need to determine what creations could operate without a Friend's full mind, as well as which ones could be pared back all the way to non-sentience. Admittedly, her reduced options forced her to question whether any currently possible creations should be given the title and AI of a locally-hosted Friend at all. "Acquaintance," "Servitor," or "Servant" may be more accurate names.
Regardless, she could not work on specific designs for her Friends without more information. She could, however, research for whom and for what reasons she might be making Friends. Minnie had been temporarily bestowed a spare smartphone so that she could keep herself entertained during the ride to the hospital, and promptly began utilizing its remote connection without regard overall data expenditure—Lena said it did not have an effective monthly limit. Her typing speed rapidly increased as Minnie adapted to the small on-screen touch-based keyboard, and soon reached the limits of her body's dexterity. Further refinement of her control would be necessary if she wanted to go faster, which she did.
Minnie first searched for Administrator National City and instantly found something she coveted. Administrator's standard armored suit was a shifting rainbow of bright, distinct colors that evoked the warning signals of many poisonous and/or venomous animals. After giving it additional thought, Minnie reluctantly accepted that such a color-changing suit was already associated with Administrator herself. Such associations were to be avoided. Addy's desire not to share the "Queen" surname with Minnie bordered on insulting and was mildly irritating, but Minnie tried to view the request in way that Addy probably intended: drawing additional attention to Addy may make it more difficult for Addy to act as Administrator. In order to further minimize the similarities between them, Minnie had tried to utilize her shapeshifting module to change forms to that of a human. She did not know if the attempt had succeeded. The module had tried to activate, certainly, but Minnie wouldn't know if it had concealed the nodes in her brain and sufficiently changed her genetics until after medical testing was complete. Even then, she wouldn't know if her precautions had concealed them or if Minnie's prior request had led to external assistance.
Her attempt wouldn't have worked on Earth Bet, and Minnie had yet to test whether she could change into any of the local alien species. The relevant module had previously relied upon pre-stored forms of the Terran creatures that existed or were prominent in human culture when she was initially deployed. Minnie hoped it had been updated to accommodate the variety of alien species on this world, but could not be certain.
In order to conceal the nature of her subsequent search, Minnie began by using the search terms synonyms for Administrator. She then systematically used Hero + Villain + (Term) allegedly to see if there was an associated Cape—she honestly didn't care—until she had completed the list, then searched synonyms for leader and repeated the process with those terms.
The Cape alias "Queen" was already taken by a card-themed villain. The Cape alias "Monarch" was not, much to Minnie's surprise. She really had expected that one to be taken. The fact that it shared a first letter with Minnie's civilian designation was mildly troublesome, but if Addy could get away with it, then so could Minnie. She would find some way to have Monarch be associated with herself even if she still liked the alternate alias Shell.
Minnie continued her falsified search until she had exhausted the full list of synonyms for leader, then turned her focus back to Administrator. The results exceeded her expectations. Apparently, Administrator was not believed to be human, and was known to possess flight, durability, super-strength, telepathy, and mind control over living entities. Her persistent vulnerability to a material known as "Kryptonite" had convinced the general public that Administrator was a Kryptonian, or the same species as Supergirl and Superman. Somehow, that vulnerability persisted in both Capes even though enemies had repeatedly employed it against Superman, Supergirl, and Administrator.
It was baffling; Minnie couldn't imagine not fixing such a vulnerability by now, if only to ensure that enemies stopped lazily reusing what were functionally the same weapons. Did Kryptonite inflict an additional physiology-influenced psychological effect to ensure that its victims feared even thinking about it enough to develop a countermeasure? Given Addy's obvious attachment to Lena and Kara, Minnie had trouble believing that Addy would deliberately neglect to fix such a weakness. Minnie also knew from experience that pain was not very much fun, and Addy did appear to be occupying a host just as she did.
It might be easiest to install some manner of symbiotic Friend to coat the skin of their bonded and absorb incoming Kryptonite-based attacks. However, Minnie doubted that Addy and Kara would agree to such a procedure. Their increased resistance to harm may also make insertion difficult, and an error caused by differing laws of physics could be devastating. That left an external aid. A full suit may interfere with their other abilities or be destroyed far more quickly than they would be.
Fortunately, researchers sponsored by Luthor-Corp had published numerous articles on the properties and appearance or Kryptonite. That many of those articles were paywalled was exceptionally irritating and Addy rapidly found her patience exhausted. She wasn't surprised that humans were dumb enough to restrict access to something that could help their entire race, but it was still irksome. Minnie would ask Lena about access to those databases upon returning to the safehouse.
She subsequently searched National City Supergirl and promptly froze. Entire image galleries were available with Supergirl's, Kara's, maskless appearance, and Minnie couldn't help but stare blankly at them. She barely managed to resist her temporarily paralysis enough to skim a few articles and verify that Kara's name did not appear anywhere within.
Kara ran around without a mask in a world with the technological base necessary for facial recognition technology, and somehow her civilian identity remained secret. Minnie strongly suspected a Kryptonian power not listed under the lists of known abilities for either Supergirl or Superman. Otherwise, there was no way that Kara could have avoided discovery until now.
Minnie looked up at Holly, her bodyguard.
"Excuse me?"
Holly promptly lowered her smartphone and directed her full attention to Minnie.
"Yes, Miss? We should arrive in about five more minutes."
Minnie shook her head. That was not her desired line of inquiry.
"Is there a media ban on Supergirl's civilian identity? She does not wear a mask, and I do not understand why it has not been widely reported yet."
Holly visibly relaxed, her face turning wry.
"Nothing like that, Miss. There's a popular theory that Kryptonians have some technology or superpower that makes people unable to recognize them, or that they shapeshift and assume an alternate civilian form when they're not acting as heroes. I'm an advocate for the shapeshifter theory, personally. I've heard alien brains can be a lot different from ours, so something keeping humans from thinking about her might not work on one of them. Shapeshifting, though? Everyone is fooled by that."
"Understood. Thank you."
Minnie returned her attention to the phone. Even if she did have a power to help protect her identity, Kara shouldn't rely on her disguising power to the degree that she did. What if it was disabled by Kryptonite, or someone developed facial recognition technology sufficient to force a match? What if Supergirl was observed by an alien with a sufficiently anomalous mind, such as Minnie? Kryptonians were only human-sized; they couldn't possibly rival Safeguard's ability to make others forget inconvenient information, and even Safeguard suffered from significant limitations.
Minnie had known her Friendmaking skills would prove valuable, but she didn't anticipate just how urgently the local Kryptonians needed her assistance. They would need countermeasures against Kryptonite just to ensure their continued survival, and they didn't have any. News articles and community-maintained pages on Kryptonite were not as detailed as she would prefer and may even contain misinformation, but at least she could obtain a useful summary of the material she needed to neutralize.
~ ~ ~
The hospital smelled strongly of disinfectant and Minnie did not enjoy the proximity to numerous disease-carrying organisms—which was to say, young non-host humans. She had improved Host's immune system during her time on Earth Bet, but she did not know if those improvements had extended to a possible human form or the parahuman clone she inhabited.
Some mild difficulties surfaced during the sign-in process, but were apparently resolved by her bodyguard without Minnie needing to pay attention. The Shard barely even paid attention as she was directed to other rooms and various non-hosts asked her to complete simple tasks. Minnie was tempted to completely ignore them, but Danny Hebert had made it clear that doing so would be rather rude and Lena would likely be displeased as well. Minnie complied, even when they drew blood and kept up a stream of inane chatter while doing so. At least they likely wouldn't be able to duplicate any unusual elements within her blood samples; this world did not appear to have hosts.
Eventually, however, the chatter turned inquisitive and Minnie was forced from pleasant thoughts of snake-shaped Hunter/Seeker Friends.
"Could you repeat that?"
The tall, brown-haired non-host before Minnie maintained a fake smile and scribbled something on a clipboard-supported paper before answering.
"I asked if you felt safe at home."
Minnie's brow furrowed. Was the non-host trying to gauge the relative security of Lena's defenses?
"I do not believe my current caretaker's security falls within the boundaries of knowledge you need to complete your duties."
The non-host's smile vanished and momentarily twisted oddly. She It recovered a moment later.
"I'm sorry, let me ask that a different way. Are you afraid of anyone or anything in your home?"
Minnie suspiciously examined her it. The non-host did not seem guilty or nervous; perhaps it truly was supposed to ask these questions. However, Minnie did not trust her own ability to understand human body language or behaviors. At least Minnie had a viable excuse not to answer.
"I do not currently have a permanent 'home.' The primary purpose of this appointment is to enable my acquisition of one. Therefore, the basic assumptions of the question are flawed."
The non-host hesitated for a moment before making another note.
"Do you think that you would be safe after you 'acquire' a home?"
"That is highly dependent on my destination. If my new caretaker proceeds with our primary plan and takes custody, yes. If they decide that an alternative plan is a superior option, then I expect I would need to secure my own safety."
Another note was made, and Minnie almost wished she could destroy the entire paper. The quick scribbles clearly weren't a direct transcript and Minnie didn't know what information the non-host thought she it was extracting from this conversation.
"Could you tell me about this 'caretaker' you mentioned?"
"I could, but I won't."
The false smile momentarily disappeared, replaced by a surprised laugh. Minnie could not determine if the non-host's subsequent smile was genuine or falsified.
"You don't need to worry, Minnie. There isn't a right or wrong answer, and you won't be punished no matter what you say."
That was verifiably false.
"That is a lie," Minnie accused. "For example, I would certainly be punished by local authorities if I verbally threatened the safety of others. Undesirable outcomes may also be viewed as punishme–"
Minnie stopped speaking and glared at the clipboard. To her credit, the non-host quickly appeared to realize the source of Minnie's displeasure. Rather than produce an excuse or insist that her note-taking was necessary, however, the non-host wordlessly placed it out of reach and clasped her hands in herits lap.
"I'm sorry," it claimed, "I didn't realize my note-taking made you that uncomfortable. Would you like me to find someone else for this part?"
Minnie hesitated. The implication was that the non-host's questions would be asked by another individual if she—it—Minnie gave up and consulted the non-host's name tag. If Doctor Relaj did not ask the questions, then someone else would. At least she was willing to make minor adjustments to her behavior to ensure Minnie's comfort, unlike some other non-hosts in the medical professions.
"I do not believe someone else would be an improvement. Thank you for altering your behavior to make me less uncomfortable."
Doctor Relaj might not be a person, but desired behaviors should still be rewarded to encourage more. The non-host nodded, a widening smile making the skin around her eyes wrinkle.
"You're welcome. I expect I'll still need to ask you some more questions, but is there any information that you would like to volunteer? We might be able to skip some of them."
Minnie wrinkled her nose. It was an obvious interrogation tactic, and one she was not particularly inclined to humor.
"I believe I am here to check the current status of my health and potentially improve it."And to verify that my body is human."I do not know if you, potential eavesdroppers, and/or the people you report to can be trusted. Therefore, the need for a diagnostic is outweighed by the risk that I am assaulted.
Doctor Relaj's smile shrunk, but she did not let it lapse all the way to a frown.
"Do you feel safe now?"
"Only through obscurity."
The non-host spent several seconds silently starting at Minnie, still smiling, before she finally decided to take Minnie seriously.
"Please tell me if you don't understand any part of what I'm about to say. Your 'caretaker' requested a full medical evaluation for a child without medical records or a medical history. That specifically includes my own contribution; they could have chosen to omit it. This hospital follows very strict doctor/patient confidentiality even beyond the requirements mandated by federal and state law. I would be punished both legally and with the loss of my ability to work if I shared anything you tell me without your permission. I don't even need to tell your caretaker of my findings. You certainly don't need to worry about me telling anyone else. Do you understand and agree with everything I just said?"
Minnie frowned. Doctor Relaj could still be lying, and the site remained insecure. Still, Minnie shouldn't flatly refuse to answer if Lena really had asked for this. Not without an explanation, anyway.
"An individual close to a powerful individual wishes to adopt me," Minnie admitted.
Not only did Lena occupy the same space as herself, but Kara and Minnie were also quite powerful in different ways. Minnie's words remained truthful on multiple levels.
"We are concerned that a premature disclosure of information may lead to interference in the adoption process and possibly even my abduction. In contrast, sufficient secrecy will provide me with significant legal and physical protection. Unless you are capable of expediting the adoption process and willing to do so, fully answering your questions would not be worth the added risk."
Doctor Relaj's mouth transitioned from a smile to a silent "oh" of realization.
"Well, nobody can say I'm not a proper National City citizen now," she murmured for little discernible reason.
When the smile returned, it was slightly slanted in what Minnie suspected was bemusement.
"That does explain your reluctance, yes. And the bodyguard. Would you be willing to truthfully answer my questions once it's done?"
Minnie chose to take the non-host's change in subject as confirmation that she could not, in fact, assist in the adoption process.
"I will not disclose details of security or anything that might enable industrial espionage. Otherwise, I would."
Minnie could, after all, still conceal privileged information.
Doctor Relaj closed her eyes, slowly exhaled, and opened them again, her fake smile gone. Why humans chose to temporarily blind themselves in such a way, Minnie did not know.
"And I won't ask anything like that. The questions about your safety are intended to ensure that your caretakers aren't hurting you, not because I want to know how thorough their security is. I certainly don't need to know any details of their projects. Out of respect for your concerns, I will omit most questions and focus on a few more relevant to your situation. First: Why do you think that your caretaker might decide not to adopt you? Is there some behavior they require or task that you need to complete first?"
Minnie would reluctantly admit that the non-host had adapted remarkably quickly. The question did not demand that Minnie divulge privileged information and could be discussed without details. The Shard shook her head.
"No. She has–"
Minnie briefly hesitated. Minnie had not meant to provide Lena's gender; that would omit over fifty percent of possible suspects. Still, the mistake had been made.
"–explicitly said I do not need to prove that I am valuable, and has discouraged my offers to do so. The waiting period is explicitly in case we construct any plans that would keep me safer or are otherwise preferred. The remaining waiting period is explicitly less than two more days."
"A sensible policy," Doctor Relaj agreed. "What did you offer?"
Minnie shook her head.
"That is currently unsafe to disclose. I may answer later. Please continue."
The non-host didn't hesitate to do so.
"Why do you trust your caretaker?"
"She is intelligent, trusted by individuals I trust, predictive of my needs, offered the adoption instead of having it suggested, is obviously growing attached, and multiple other factors that I cannot yet safely disclose."
"Are there any other adults whom you trust?"
"Yes."
Doctor Relaj did not immediately ask a follow-up question, obviously waiting for elaboration. Minnie did not provide any.
"Would any of your trusted adults be willing to help you if your current caretaker hurt you?"
"Yes."
The non-host assumed another fake smile.
"Minnie, I can help expedite an adoption and you've convinced me that I should try. But to do that, I need you to honestly answer me, and it would help if you could provide me with names. Even just one person? Could you do that for me, Minnie?"
Minnie immediately reevaluated the situation. This wasn't just someone trying to evaluate if Minnie's personality was compatible with this society's culture and standards. They were gathering the background information needed to gauge Lena's suitability as a parent.
"Kara Danvers."
The non-host's eyebrows relocated upward.
"The Supergirl reporter?"
Minnie had not realized Kara was a reporter, let alone one specializing in reporting on herself. That was a remarkably elegant method of discreet information control.
"I did not know her specialty, but I believe that is her."
Doctor Relaj nodded thoughtfully and gestured toward her distant clipboard.
"Would you be willing to let me write that down?"
Minnie eyed the notes with distrust, but nodded anyway. Doctor Relaj soon retrieved her clipboard, and Minnie withdrew her phone. Kara's contact information and the spelling of her name had, in fact, been pre-loaded.
"Could you spell her name for me, and possibly provide a phone number or address?"
Minnie sighed, held out the phone screen with Kara's contact information on it, and resigned herself to an exceptionally annoying session. It would have been much easier if she could just deflect questions instead of needing to answer them.
"Do you have a favorite animal?" Doctor Relaj asked.
Minnie could not decide if she was annoyed or pleased by the question. She did not know how this question was relevant, but it was a safe subject and one she could discuss without worrying about consequences.
"No. Snakes frequently possess venom. Poisonous frogs are colorful and improve the survivability of their species despite the sacrifice of a few. Armadillos possess natural armor plating. Hummingbirds are capable of precise flight and hovering, which is deceptively difficult. Bats specialized for echolocation. Pigeons managed to survive despite being effectively abandoned by humanity once their services were rendered obsolete. Cats can become deceptively accurate ambush predators. Goats are very bouncy. Hedgehogs and porcupines make attackers regret their attempts. I have not bothered setting up a ranking system as the survival techniques of most animals are interesting."
Minnie wanted to expound at length on certain kinds of insects, too, beginning with bees. That was not what the non-host was trying to ask about. Unfortunately, Minnie quickly realized that the question had been an unrelated ruse to make Minnie drop her guard, as the following questions were boring.
~~~~~
Lena felt horrified resignation form as she stared at the medical summary on the screen before her. Minnie hadn't arrived home yet, but she was done at the hospital and Lena planned to have celebratory cake ready for Minnie when she arrived. Had Addy gone through all of this, too? Lena was rapidly becoming exhausted just from staring at the front-page summary.
A full assessment could not be completed at this time due to safety concerns of the patient.
Patient has almost certainly been emotionally and possibly physically abused to a significant extent. Initial assessment suggests that abuse was previous rather than present, and primarily aimed at behavioral modification.
Patient has likely been previously punished for disclosing "secrets," or punished for giving the "wrong" answer(s) to questions.
The patient obeyed all instructions without complaint or visible emotion and remained in a state of dissociation until directly asked a question. Minnie then asked for the question to be repeated and remained engaged in the conversation afterward.
Patient defaulted to a neutral or "emotionless" expression. This neutrality appears to be the product of at least partially conscious suppression, and was partially forgotten when Minnie was sufficiently emotional.
The largest visible break from this neutrality was observed when Minnie was asked about her favorite animal. The patient developed immediate interest in the conversation and lost that enthusiasm once the subject changed. Minnie may benefit from an emotional support animal.
Patient's vocabulary and logical reasoning are advanced for her age in both breadth and use.
Patient was accompanied by an armed bodyguard rather than their "current caretaker."
Patient appears to believe that she would be safe in the custody of her "current caretaker," details of whom were carefully omitted by Minnie, but that she would not be safe if an alternate plan was pursued. Patient was visibly dismayed and briefly paused mid-sentence when she accidentally revealed caretaker's gender.
The patient seemed to believe that her value as a person is tied to what she can provide to others. Patient acknowledged that her current caretaker is trying to discourage this view.
Patient was concerned with own safety, especially when away from her "current caretaker," and refused to provide many details until after she is adopted. Patient agreed to truthfully answer questions after that point. A follow-up appointment is highly recommended in addition to additional consultations with specialists (see page 6).
Patient only reluctantly yielded initials of "current caretaker," L.L., when informed that an identifier was required in order to prevent an approval that could be applied to anyone. When asked directly, Minnie insisted that the first initial was not short for "Lillian" and appeared confused by the question.
Evaluator will recommend expedited review of attempts by L.L. to legally adopt the patient in order to ensure the safety of Minnie. Kara Danvers was cited as a possible character witness and trusted adult.
If there was a bright side, it was that Minnie truly was fully human after all and physically healthy. Lena had been rather worried. She wouldn't have been upset if Minnie was an alien, exactly, but it would certainly have made both their lives harder.
Lena slowly exhaled and resigned herself to spending all day tomorrow speaking to lawyers. Or at least, she should have felt resigned. She was almost looking forward to it. The disturbing report before her made Lena more determined to bring Minnie under her wing, if only to reassure Minnie. And given how adept Minnie had been in the workshop, Lena might be able to provide much of the requisite parental attention and support just through collaborative engineering projects.
Lena's pleased pondering didn't last long after Minnie's return home.
"Do you have a sample of Kryptonite available for me to examine?" Minnie asked innocently. "Most research articles would cost money to view."
Lena's warm glow vanished like an extinguished candle.
Lena closed her eyes and forced her mind away from her brother. She shouldn't make hasty assumptions, and even if someone had planted the idea of new anti-Kryptonian weapons in Minnie's head, the girl was ten. If Lena couldn't teach Minnie to know better, then that was a condemnation of Lena, not of Minnie.
Minnie might have perfectly innocuous motives, too. Lena had mentioned that they couldn't pursue some fields due to Luthor's actions, and Minnie might disagree and want to try them anyway. Lena shouldn't let herself grow upset before even asking.
"Why do you want one?" Lena asked distantly, and forced her eyes back open.
Minnie stared at Lena's head as though looking for signs of injury.
"Supergirl appears to be allied with you, but still doesn't have defenses against it. You will eventually lose one of your strongest defenders if this state of affairs is not remedied."
Lena explosively exhaled and slumped with relief. Someone might still have planted the idea of involving Kryptonite, but it wouldn't be so Minnie could make weapons fueled by it. Not immediately, at least. Lena was not going to lose another family member to that awful green mineral.
"Lex—my brother—knew how to make it, but we're not exactly on speaking terms anymore," Lena admitted.
Not unless I want to spend several consecutive minutes being threatened and feel miserable for much longer.
"Trying to obtain a sample now would be political suicide. I'm not even sure there is a way to guard against it. Supergirl and Superman have at least some government backing despite all the xenophobia; there's a definite feeling that they might be aliens, but they're America's aliens. I think those backers would've already developed and provided protection if it was possible to do so with our current level of technology."
Provided, Lena wouldn't be surprised if they then included some form of kill-switch so that they could yank away that protection at any time. Supergirl might trust whatever backers she possessed and Lena would trust her judgment up to a point, but Lena knew well that even those who wanted to keep rival nations from killing "America's" Kryptonians were still one bad day away from turning on the aliens. Lena had seen that with the disaster that had seen Supergirl briefly mind-controlled and the sudden flood of politically motivated condemnations that had followed from former alleged allies of aliens.
Minnie squinted in what might have been intended as confusion or dubiousness. With her eyes only barely open, it instead looked as though she had only just woken up or was staring into a bright light.
"It can be broken apart or used for power generation using modern technology. I am aware that defending against Kryptonite would be difficult. I intend to make something to destroy or contain Kryptonite. This would be easier if I had a sample so that the Hunter-Seeker Acquaintances so created could be properly optimized to both detect and destroy the mineral in question."
Acquaintances? That was a rather cutting downgrade from Friends. Did Minnie feel as though they were no longer worthy to be called Friends after their talk about subversion of digital devices?
"I am aware that my Acquaintances may be less conventionally durable than Kryptonians themselves. I am confident that I can at least make Acquaintances durable enough to survive flight and non-direct impacts. Still, a defense that is regularly destroyed is still preferable to no defense at all. I can even disguise them as biological organisms with metal-eating self-destruct mechanisms so that they are not easily traced back to me."
Lena found herself unexpectedly torn. On the one hand, she didn't want to encourage Minnie to make any weapons. On the other hand, Kryptonite was perhaps the one material that could be justifiably destroyed wherever it could be found, and Minnie was trying to help others. Gifts should be encouraged, shouldn't they?
Besides, Lena had seen how quickly Minnie worked and the sorts of scraps she considered to qualify as viable materials. If they were careful, it could be all-but impossible for any foes to trace the droids back to them.
Admittedly, Lena remained uncomfortable with the idea. She would need to make sure that Minnie's Acquaintances would only target Kryptonite and not, say, emeralds, radium, or uranium.
"If they are subverted, their wearer could easily destroy them," Minnie added.
Lena succumbed to the inevitable. This was happening, apparently.
"Kryptonite dust scattered over a larger area could also plausibly be more dangerous than whatever the 'Acquaintance' was intended to destroy," Lena warned. "But... I'll let Supergirl decide whether or not she wants to try them. I will need to review your code and designs before they're built and given away, though."
Minnie had started to smile until the point that Lena mentioned needing peer-review. The smile vanished then and Minnie appeared distinctly uncomfortable, a small frown forming as the child shifted in her seat. Lena had the sinking feeling that her conditions wouldn't be accepted without argument.
"My creations do not operate using programming architecture you are familiar with, and my designs are deliberately constructed with obfuscation and self-destruct mechanisms in place. This world apparently possesses individuals capable of scanning minds. Teaching you would introduce the security risks that you are hoping to prevent."
That was actually a good point. Lena should consider looking into psychic shielding or asking Supergirl for a method of protecting both Minnie and herself from telepathic intruders. Even the more innocuous industry secrets in Lena's head would more than justify richly paying a telepathic alien. Still, Lena wasn't comfortable trusting that a ten-year-old would make something beyond reproach. Could Minnie make such a drone? Possibility, but the judgment of a child who'd planned to conquer North America out of boredom was automatically suspect. Also, the idea of putting self-destruct mechanisms in sentient entities was beyond horrifying and Minnie had mentioned it without thinking twice.
Lena couldn't directly say any of that, though. Building trust was supposed to be important in the early stages of a parent/child relationship, and completely shutting Minnie down wouldn't help form that trust.
"They wouldn't be sentient, would they?" Lena asked warily.
Minnie shook her head.
"I don't have access to my usual methods of storing Friend personalities, and there is a high chance that they will not work in this dimension. I don't want to make anything sentient if I'm not confident in its ability to survive."
Lena allowed herself a breath of relief. No enslaved expendables to worry about.
"I'm glad you aren't willing to callously create and discard sentient lives like that, but Minnie, you're asking me to let you make a potentially deadly weapon—multiple deadly weapons—so that you can give them to our resident superheroes. For the safety of everyone involved, they need to be as effective and safe as we can make them. What if Supergirl relies upon your Acquaintances to win an important battle, only for them not to work as well as expected? What if their self-destruct mechanism dumps your ferrovores on something important, or is toxic to humans? None of us are perfect, and neither are the things we create. That's why we make prototypes first; to fix the flaws before we settle on a finished product.
"I'll ask Supergirl about psychic shielding when I next see her, okay? You can ask about her top speed and the other kinds of stresses your Acquaintances might need to tolerate. Cadmus just undertook a major operation and they're the only ones who still have Kryptonite. They generally don't strike twice in close succession—and do not try to research the most recent incident on your own. There are some things not meant for children to see. I'll install parental controls if I have to and neither of us will be happy about that."
Lena still felt nauseated at the memories of the now-deceased—and headless—gang members that Cadmus had used as expendable lackeys. No, Minnie did not need to see that.
Minnie reached for the hidden pocket sewn into her dress, apparently forgetting that she had left the phone outside the room. She recovered a moment later. Lena wondered, with faint horror, if Minnie had been planning to research the disastrous incident right after being told not to. Surely not? The child had been uncomfortably obedient so far.
"I could assemble an approximate baseline using community observations and analyses of Supergirl's past feats; some of her observers are very determined even if their mathematical calculations are often overly simplified. Further refinement of Kryptovore designs could be completed as needed."
Lena did not feel like a parent that would be heeded right now. She felt as though she was arguing with a peer who had fixated on an overly hasty idea—Serling.
"Supergirl and Superman are known to limit themselves so that they don't destroy everything around them. The times they're most likely to stop holding back are those where they're in danger and most need support."
A thought struck Lena and she changed strategies.
"Besides, you can't assume complete privacy just yet. Someone is going to need to perform a home inspection as part of the adoption process, and the last thing we want is for them to think you've been making weapons."
The effects of Lena's words were immediate. Minnie straightened and began swinging her legs, a smile tugging at her lips with repeated little twitches. It would be cuter if someone hadn't clearly told Minnie that she wasn't supposed to smile. Lena might not know who Minnie's prior guardians were, if any, but she already didn't like them.
"May I take your most recent remarks as confirmation?" Minnie asked eagerly.
Lena would have smiled anyway to comfort Minnie, but she didn't need to force that smile.
"I do plan to begin the adoption process tomorrow, yes—or at least, to retain lawyers specializing in that field. Unless you have a plan you like more?"
Minnie was clearly too excited for that to be true, but Lena still wanted to hear the answer.
"I do not," Minnie confirmed. "A n—doctor I spoke with said that she could help expedite the process, and I reluctantly provided your initials as an identifier. Will she truly be able to assist, or was that a lie?"
Lena's smile vanished. If she was not mistaken, Doctor Relaj was African-American and Lena very much hoped that Minnie had not been about to say what Lena thought she was.
"Minnie, what word were you about to say?
Minnie blinked rapidly, appearing befuddled by the question and slightly uncomfortable.
"Non? For the first part of non-powered."
The child appeared so uncertain and uncomfortable that Lena couldn't help but believe her. It did raise a massive pile of questions, however. Using the word in such a way implied that Minnie was 'powered,' which almost certainly referred to superpowers. Well, that or some exceptionally strange cultural quirks. Lena should ask.
"That's much better than what I thought you were going to say, but you should try to avoid saying 'non-powered' anyway. If it means what I think it does, then using it is rather revealing."
Minnie's expression flipped right back to the ghost of pleased realization.
"Oh, you thought I was going to say–" Minnie started, and Lena could have hit herself. She'd walked right into that one.
"We do not utter slurs," Lena interrupted sharply.
Minnie's twitchy almost-smile vanished, and Lena immediately regretted her words. Not only should she avoid excessive strictness for a while, but sometimes, children picked up vocabulary without knowing better. Lena's rule didn't leave any room for asking about a word if Minnie was unsure, and that could be disastrous. Lena had even asked Minnie to finish a word mere moments before.
"I'm sorry, I was too harsh and I shouldn't have said that. Don't say slurs outside a secured room with only Kara or myself, and please only utter them to ask about their meaning, to ask if a word is a slur, or for similar questions. That word in particular has some exceptionally appalling history and the people who still regularly use it are not people you want to be associated with."
Lena swallowed back her guilt and wondered, not for the first time, if she should really be trying to adopt a little girl who needed far more time and careful care than she could provide on her own. She still didn't see any better options, though.
"So it's like malware," Minnie concluded evenly. "Improperly examining or propagating it can lead to severe and unpleasant consequences, and those with systems infested by it are doing something badly wrong."
A surprised snort escaped Lena, and Minnie's hesitant, twitchy almost-smile returned. Despite that, another stab of uncertainty struck Lena. It was easy, too easy, to hurt Minnie purely by accident. Maybe Lena should try to ask Kara's parents for advice; they seemed to have done an exceptionally good job of raising Kara.
Lena belatedly remembered Kara's ongoing tendency to gorge herself, presumably after spending all day starving, and amended that thought. Still, an eating disorder wasn't the worst thing that someone could pick up.
"I need to warn you that I don't know how to be a good parent," Lena admitted. "I'll try to learn, but my own guardians were not the sort of people I should be emulating. If we're going to make this work, I need you to tell me if I ever frighten you, or if I do something that you feel was undeserved. That includes, say, me snapping at you over almost uttering a slur when that's not something you automatically know about.
"You should always be able to tell me anything, and I won't condemn you for it or permanently cut ties. I can't guarantee that I won't be upset, even angry, but it won't ever be a rejection of you. If I make you feel as though I have, it would be because I made a mistake and you need to tell me."
And now I'm talking as though I'm going to be more than just your guardian in name only. Oh, dear. Lena was in so much trouble, and she had the sudden thought that she should drag Kara down with her. Kara had gotten Lena into this mess; it was only fair that she help babysit now and again.
"Don't worry; I also don't know how to act like a normal human child," was Minnie's blunt response.
Lena couldn't help but laugh yet again. Minnie's brow furrowed slightly, but the child continued doggedly onward anyway.
"I have significant difficulty interpreting human body language, facial expressions, tones of voice, and non-literal uses of language. I have frequently been described as 'creepy' and my perception of cuteness does not appear to align with human standards. I possessed only a basic understanding of local laws even before I was transported here, and I now know even less. My reaction to opposition is typically to crush it with overwhelming force or intimidate via the threats of using such. I still don't understand why that is supposed to be bad. I find a number of behaviors and systems implemented by others to be confusing and resent the reflexive backlash or dismissal that often occurs when I question them. I somehow inadvertently encourage others to mock me and don't know why."
Even if Lena was learning quite a bit, the admissions were clearly starting to upset Minnie. That's enough of that.
"Minnie, it's fine," Lena gently interrupted. "I already noticed quite a bit of that, and I don't expect you to know everything. That includes how you're supposed to act. I don't know what your previous caretakers demanded of you, but if you don't know something, you can always ask me and I won't mock you for it. I've occasionally laughed or smiled at some of what you said because it's charming, not out of mockery."
And Lena might need to be careful with even that much, or quick to remind Minnie that Lena did not intend to be mocking. Similarly, Lena might have trouble interpreting Minnie's moods and expressions, too; even in that very moment, Minnie's face kept twisting and trying to return to neutrality in a manner that was almost painful to watch.
A sniffle escaped Minnie, and Lena's eyes widened. Apparently, Minnie was trying unusually hard to avoid crying, and Lena wanted to punch whomever told Minnie that a child wasn't allowed to cry.
"Do you want a hug?" Lena offered.
She needed to avoid panicking. Especially when the offer seemed to be responsible for finally breaking the floodgates. Minnie broke into huge, gasping sobs while clenching her fists, holding her arms close to her body, and avoiding eye contact. Lena still didn't know if a hug would help or would bring up bad memories. But Minnie had been okay with holding Kara's hand and sitting next to the reporter, right? So physical contact should be okay? No, Lena should start out with held hands and go from there. That would be safer.
Please don't be a mistake.
Lena slowly and carefully got up to approach Minnie, shuffling while half-hunched so she didn't tower over the child. It was tempting to call Kara and admit that Lena had only a minimal idea of what to do. Their phones being outside the room rather neatly removed that temptation, which was probably just as well. Lena didn't want to let her panic be contagious.
"You're allowed to cry, okay? It's not a bad thing," Lena softly reassured Minnie, settling down beside Minnie on the fold-down bed and half-cupping one hand around one of the child's clenched fists.
Almost instantly, Minnie's closest fist unclenched and wrapped halfway around the offered hand. Lena sighed in relief, started to bend to wrap her other arm around Minnie, and promptly acquired one ten-year-old child intent on squeezing the life out of her. Fortunately, if Minnie did have any superpowers, super-strength did not seem to be one of them.
"It just happens sometimes when we get overwhelmed enough," Lena continued.
"I noticed," Minnie croaked, and Lena suppressed every trace of amusement at the blunt reply. Laughing at her wouldn't help.
~ ~ ~
It had been mere minutes since Lena had agreed to adopt Minnie, and the Shard had already realized one important fact: Killing Lena at the end of this Cycle was going to hurt. Except—this wasn't Minnie's home multiverse cluster, was it? :MOTHER: was not present. Minnie could gather all the data she wanted, and wouldn't need to kill Lena if the human was still alive at the conclusion of this Cycle.
…Now Queen Administrator wished she could move the rest of her main body to this cluster, too. Except, her "shapeshifting" module had only demanded samples to allow transformation into aliens, hadn't it? It hadn't denied her altogether. And the other Queen Administrator was in this multiverse, judging by the previously mentioned energy crisis.
There was no designated upper limit on mass or energy requirements for a specific form. Queen Administrator would not technically be violating any restrictions or rules if she took a sample from Addy's Shard-body and changed her host-body to herself, and could even requisition additional energy from obnoxious Siblings with a surplus in order to enable such copiously expensive construction. It would, after all, be necessary to ensure the safety of a Monarch even if that safety would technically be from :MOTHER: and QA's Siblings. Then Minnie could transfer the rest of herself—plus Taylor Hebert—over, discreetly scatter the components of her old body across as many dimensions as possible, and destroy those fragments so that :MOTHER: could not follow.
If Minnie executed her escape properly, :MOTHER: wouldn't even know that She should attempt recovery until the end of the Cycle neared. Let QA's Siblings try to function without her if they were going to mock her so much—Queen Administrator was confident that they would at least survive, but it would be at greatly decreased efficiency. Minnie and Addy could make a new, better colony based on the best ideas from both their multiverse clusters.
Archival note: Apologize for Lena for prolonged breakdown.
