Chapter 7 : Secrets and Suspicions
January 2016 — DEO Desert Facility — Armory
The shelf buckled without warning.
One moment I was cataloging weapon modifications, making notes about the Vartox axe fragments we'd recovered last month. The next, metal groaned overhead and a cascade of equipment—tactical vests, spare magazines, a crate of flash grenades—came tumbling down.
Directly toward Alex.
My hand moved before conscious thought engaged. Vector sense flared, that spider-silk connection snapping into place across a dozen falling objects. I pushed—not physically, but mathematically, redirecting trajectories the way I'd practiced a thousand times in my apartment.
The equipment slammed sideways into the adjacent wall. Crates cracked. Magazines scattered across the floor. None of it touched Alex.
She stood frozen, eyes fixed on my outstretched hand.
Then the nosebleed started.
Shit.
I reached for my face, trying to catch the blood before it dripped onto my shirt. Too late. Red droplets spotted the concrete floor like accusation marks.
"Did you just—" Alex's voice was calm. Too calm. The voice of someone carefully controlling their reaction. "Did you just do what I think you did?"
"The shelf was faulty. Old bolts. The equipment was already falling sideways when—"
"Stop."
She stepped closer. Her hand hadn't gone to her sidearm, but I noticed how her weight shifted—ready to move, ready to fight. Agent Danvers assessing a potential threat.
"I've been watching you for weeks, Winn. The Vartox analysis. The combat predictions. How you always know where to look before something happens." Her jaw tightened. "I thought you were just smart. But this? This is something else."
The armory felt smaller suddenly. Walls pressing in. Security cameras in the corners, probably recording everything.
J'onn will see this. Henshaw. Whoever.
"Alex—"
"Private room. Now."
DEO — Secure Conference Room B
The door clicked shut behind us.
Alex hit the switch that activated the room's scrambling field—I felt it as a faint buzz against my electromagnetic sense, static disrupting surveillance frequencies. She'd chosen this room deliberately. Whatever happened next, it would stay between us.
"Talk."
I wiped my nose with the back of my hand. The bleeding had stopped, but the headache was building. Too many vectors redirected at once. I'd pushed my limits.
"I have abilities."
"Obviously. What kind?"
How much to reveal? She's a scientist. She'll want proof.
"Two types, I think. Maybe connected, maybe not." I grabbed a pen from the conference table and tossed it into the air. Vector manipulation caught it mid-fall, suspending it for a heartbeat before I let it drop. "I can redirect forces. Momentum, velocity, direction of movement. Touch helps, but I'm getting better at range."
Alex watched the pen hit the table with clinical focus.
"And the other?"
I reached for the lamp in the corner. The electricity flowed into my hand, familiar now, controllable. Blue-white arcs danced between my fingers.
"I can absorb and redirect electrical current. Store it, release it, sense it." I let the charge dissipate into the room's wiring. "Still learning that one."
"How long?"
"Since October. Maybe earlier—the electricity thing might have been dormant."
"Does Kara know?"
The question I'd been dreading.
"No."
Alex's expression didn't change, but something flickered behind her eyes. Not anger. Something more complicated.
"Why not?"
"Because she's got enough on her plate." I sat down heavily in one of the conference chairs. "She's learning to be Supergirl, dealing with the DEO, managing her secret identity, processing the Fort Rozz situation. The last thing she needs is worrying about whether her IT support guy is turning into something... else."
"Something else?"
"I don't know what I am, Alex." The admission hurt to voice. "I don't know why this is happening, or what my limits are, or if I'm going to wake up one day and find out I've mutated into something dangerous. The only thing I know for certain is that Kara needs help. And right now, I'm more useful as the guy with the notebook than the guy with the mystery powers."
Silence stretched between us. Alex studied me the way she'd study a lab specimen—not cruelly, but thoroughly. Looking for deception, inconsistencies, signs that I was more threat than asset.
"Show me again," she said finally. "The vector thing."
I picked up the pen and threw it at her face.
She flinched—instinct—but my redirect caught it six inches from her nose. The pen hung suspended, then drifted gently into her waiting palm.
"That's useful." Her voice was neutral, but I caught a hint of genuine scientific curiosity beneath the caution. "Range?"
"Eight inches, reliably. More if I push, but that's when the nosebleeds start."
"Processing limit?"
"Maybe a dozen objects simultaneously. Haven't tested the upper bound."
"The electricity—can you generate it, or only absorb?"
"Absorb, store, redirect. Generation is... I don't know yet. Haven't found a safe way to test."
Alex set the pen down carefully. Her stance had shifted—less combat-ready, more contemplative.
"My sister trusts you."
"I know."
"She trusts you more than she trusts most of the DEO."
"I know that too."
"If you hurt her—"
"I won't."
"I wasn't finished." Alex stepped closer, close enough that I could see the gold flecks in her brown eyes. "If you hurt her, I will find out what those powers of yours can really do. I'll study them. Document them. And then I'll figure out exactly how to neutralize them. Understand?"
She's terrifying. I kind of love it.
"Understood."
Something shifted in her expression. Not warmth, exactly—Alex didn't do warmth easily—but acceptance.
"5 AM. Tomorrow. Training room four. It's low-traffic, no cameras."
"You want to train me?"
"I want to understand you." She was already moving toward the door. "Training is just the method. And Winn?"
"Yeah?"
"I'm keeping this between us. For now. But if those powers become a threat—to Kara, to the DEO, to anyone—I won't hesitate."
"Fair enough."
She left without another word.
I sat alone in the conference room, head pounding, nose threatening to bleed again, and laughed.
Finally. Someone who knows.
Alex Danvers
The walk back to her station took longer than usual.
Alex's mind raced through possibilities, analyzing what she'd just witnessed the way she'd analyze any new data set. Winn Schott—IT support, conspiracy theorist, Kara's best friend—could manipulate physical forces and absorb electricity.
Metahuman. Has to be. But when? How?
The DEO tracked metahuman manifestations across the country. Particle accelerator accidents, genetic anomalies, alien exposure events. None of those categories fit Winn's profile. He'd been working at CatCo for years, mundane and ordinary, until suddenly he wasn't.
He said October. Right around when Kara debuted.
Coincidence? Alex didn't believe in those. Not anymore.
She reached her station and pulled up Winn's personnel file. Nothing unusual. Parents divorced, father incarcerated (she knew about the Toyman already), MIT graduate, clean background check. No red flags, no warning signs, no indication that he was anything other than exactly what he seemed.
Except he's not. He's been hiding powers for months, right under everyone's noses.
The question was: why?
His explanation made sense, on the surface. Kara was dealing with enough. Adding "my best friend is mutating" to her stress load would be cruel. But Alex had spent too long in intelligence work to accept explanations at face value.
What if there's more? What if he's playing a longer game?
She shook her head. Paranoia was useful, but so was intuition. And her intuition said Winn was telling the truth. He was scared, confused, and genuinely trying to help.
Doesn't mean I trust him. Means I understand him.
5 AM tomorrow. Training room four. She'd see what he could really do.
And if he turned out to be a threat?
Alex Danvers had neutralized threats before.
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