Project Dreadnought

She clutched the woman's heart in her hand as she rhythmically clenched her fist around the dying organ. There was din all around them, people wailing for help or in sorrow, sirens blaring, and more than one distraught exclamation of "SUPERGIRL!"

Supergirl, who had the mystery woman's hand inside her chest pumping her heart. Supergirl, who had just taken a horrific beating on international television by an unknown woman in ebony armor. Supergirl, who had stopped breathing two minutes ago after her sickening plunge from the top of the CatCo building after the woman in black released her throat.

Supergirl's would be saviour pulled her hood back slightly to look up into the eyes of the new adversary who had crushed National City's Hope. The woman in the hoodie looked down at the technically dead Kryptonian and muttered, "Ich bin zu alt für diese Schei?e." The ferrous stench of the Kryptonian's lifeblood clogged the air.

"HANDS UP!" a heavily armed woman screeched at figure she believed desecrating the corpse of National City's Hero. The woman in the hoodie didn't respond.

Meanwhile, Reign looked down at the chaos her debut had caused and shook her head in regret. "She needn't have died you know. Had she only stayed out of my way; she would have been able to live in the new world I will create for all of you." Her voice projected down to the masses.

The women and men in black tactical gear, along with most of the police in the area, fired on Reign. The Worldk iller just looked back at the puny humans impassively. The bullets chattering upon impact with her armor and skin driving her point to home to her attackers as much as any act of violence could; they were helpless against her. Instead of eradicating the humans foolish enough to fire on her like that, she just jetted away into the night. The fall of shattered glass fell on the humans like hail, causing further injuries and panic.

"Get your hands off her!" Agent Danvers ordered the woman crouched over her sister.

Still keeping her hand pumping Supergirl's heart, she turned slightly and called, "A little assistance would be nice, Jackboot. This one will die without it."

Alex didn't even hesitate at the unexpected distinct German accent the woman spoke with as she rushed to her sister's side. "You're…"

"Keeping the blood flowing through the Cheerleader's veins? Ja. Now, if you have access to an extraction vehicle and a stretcher, I'll accompany her to your base where she can be sewn up properly and administered the Main Sequence star radiation she'll need to recover. Stop gaping at me woman, give out some orders to your fellow jackboots.

Alex admirably set aside the German's light insults as she ordered her men to do exactly that. On the way to the DEO, the mystery woman said little else other than muttered swears in English.

An hour or so later, after Kara Zor-El was stable as she could be for being in a coma, the woman was sitting opposite Alex and J'onn in what could only be described as an interrogation suite. Well, it was a lounge, with snacks, and one of the DEO nurses was cleaning the blood off of the woman's hand, but there were handcuffs and glares and an armed set of nervous-looking guards at the door, so it was an interrogation suite.

"Who are you and how did you know about the DEO?" Alex asked in a voice that was barely better than an accusatory tone.

"You're not going to thank me for saving Supergirl's life?" the woman replied flippantly. "I mean, I did stick my hand into her chest and everything. It was very dramatic." The woman's tone was meant to provoke, and J'onn had the unenviable task of holding Alex in her seat.

"We could have resuscitated her," Alex replied.

"Oh? And you can generate enough force to administer chest compressions to a Kryptonian who could fall from orbit and shrug it off? I think not. The amount of electricity you'd need to restart her heart was unavailable to you in the field as well. So, without cutting a slit in her and manually stimulating her heart, she was finished."

"Thank you. Could you tell us your name?" J'onn asked diplomatically. He really didn't want this to devolve into a shouting match; the emotions were already so high. The fact he couldn't get into her head was concerning him, and thus she rated as a threat.

"Do you want the name I'm legally registered as, or the truth, green man?" she responded in J'onn's language. Before he could rise to her insinuation of her heritage, she cut off his potentially violent response with her next sentence, "I'm not from your sad red planet. Relax. I do like your language though. I learned it from M'gann." Both DEO members were visibly surprised at that particular name drop, but Alex rallied.

"Are we going to play these cryptic games all day?" Alex replied.

"You can call me Fae"

"No last name?" J'onn asked with a sense of foreboding.

"Juhl. Like, Julfest, Yuletide; Christmas time basically, but before the Christians appropriated it," Faye said with a shrug.

"Christmas Fairy?" Alex surmised with a raised eyebrow.

"Not very intimidating, I'll admit," Fae shrugged. "I think it goes well with my pixie cut, no?"

Alex rolled her eyes but would be lying to herself if the dark-haired pale young woman in front of her didn't have a point. "This answers none of our real question. How did you know about the DEO?" J'onn asked.

"Your little alien Gestapo is known to those who need to be wary of it. Many have lost loved ones, children even, to your men in black over the years. Taken in the night, or in broad daylight, never to be seen again. You've got quite the head start on Cadmus," Fae replied acidly. "You're like one of those filthy traitors who forced their jüdisch brothers and sisters onto the trains all those years ago aren't you? J'onn J'onzz of Mars. You and Supergirl both." Fae's icy eyes never left the Martian as she condemned him and the blonde just out of surgery. J'onn wasn't exactly sure how to reply to that. His eyes flared red as she slipped into his first language for a second time. "It's the one aspect I truly respect Superman in more than his sexier cousin.

"Stop attacking J'onn and answer the question," Alex defended her father-figure. Though to be fair she nearly slapped Fae for the crack at her sister.

"I already did. Now, if you two are done wasting my time, for saving our saviour no less, I'm going to head out and get a take-out or something."

As Fae moved to the door, there were several guns trained on her. "I don't think so," Alex smirked. "As grateful as I am for you saving Supergirl, you have raised a lot of uncomfortable questions about yourself. The kinds of questions that we would be failing in our duty to not get answers to before letting you run loose."

Fae levelled Alex with an unimpressed look before rolling her eyes and saying, "You didn't know who I was this morning did you? If I haven't popped up on your radar so far, why would I trouble you now?"

"We could say the same thing about Reign," J'onn replied quickly.

Fae tilted her head and conceded, "Okay that's a fair point. But as I demonstrated, I'm at minimum a good Samaritan. You have no just cause. If you really want to detain me, I'll get my lawyer involved and drag you cockroaches out into the light of day. We are done here."

As impressive as her tone may have been, Fae was still blocked from exit by two men who each towered over her and were armed with DEO standard weaponry. She was staring them down when J'onn said, "Are you an alien?"

Fae turned and smirked, "Is potentially sacrificing your cannon fodder by denying my freedom really the way you would want to hypothetically find out?"

Alex's hand was inching towards her sidearm and the two men guarding the door looked tense, which really struck Alex as off. There was something different about this girl, and she knew it, J'onn knew it, and the two agents were responding to her annoyance like she was some kind of predator.

"Let her go. But Ms. Juhl, we will be contacting you in the future," J'onn finally said; de-escalating the tension in the room.

"Oh, great," Fae muttered as he rather insistently placed a DEO business card in her hand. The two agents lowered their guns but didn't leave her that much room in the doorway to exit. Alex was going to order them to let her pass, but Fae decided she was fine with the men's pathetic attempt at intimidation.

Fae grinned as she walked between them. They each blocked off about a third of the door each, leaving not enough room for her to pass without colliding against them. So, when she did collide against them, they were unpleasantly shocked as they both felt they had been winged by a dickish driver who ignored the bike lanes. The two men were spun around and basically collapsed on each other, each sustaining heavy bruising where Fae had bumped into them. Alex couldn't help hut gasp a little.

Fae spun on her heel, sneered down at the two downed men and pronounced them, "Mittelm??ig." She was not troubled again on her path out of the DEO.

Back in the lounge, Alex and J'onn just looked at each other in consternation as Agent Susan Vasquez poked her head in and asked, "Who was that hottie?"