[National City, Various Locations — August 2017]
The week that followed was a education in being a hero.
Not the combat part—Mon-El had trained for that, understood the mechanics of fighting and rescuing and protecting. What he hadn't anticipated was everything else: the logistics, the relationships, the constant negotiation between privacy and public service.
Monday brought his first solo patrol as Valor.
Kara was handling a situation on the other side of the city—some kind of chemical spill at an industrial facility—so Mon-El took the downtown beat alone. He'd done patrols before, but always with her nearby, always with backup a comm call away. This felt different. This felt like a test.
The bank robbery happened around noon.
Four armed men, ski masks, a van waiting at the curb. Standard criminal playbook, no alien involvement, no exotic technology. Just human desperation meeting human greed.
Mon-El descended from the rooftop where he'd been watching, landing between the robbers and their vehicle. His TK field was already active, ready to deflect any gunfire that might threaten civilians.
"Put down the weapons," he said, keeping his voice steady. "No one needs to get hurt."
"Who the hell are you?" one of the robbers demanded, gun swinging toward him.
"I'm Valor." He let the name carry confidence he wasn't entirely feeling. "Supergirl's partner. And I'm asking you nicely to surrender."
The man fired.
Mon-El deflected the bullet—easy, automatic after months of practice. The shooter's eyes went wide. His partners dropped their bags, raised their hands.
"We give up," one of them said quickly. "Don't—whatever you just did—don't do that to us."
"I'm not going to hurt you." Mon-El used his TK to gently remove their weapons, gathering the guns into a floating cluster ten feet away. "But you are going to wait here until the police arrive. Sit down. Hands where I can see them."
They sat. They waited. When the police arrived ten minutes later, Mon-El had the robbers secured, the hostages comforted, and the stolen money ready to be inventoried.
"Valor, right?" One of the officers—a woman with sergeant stripes—approached him after the arrests were processed. "Saw your thing at the memorial. Good work today."
"Just doing my job."
"Your job." She studied him with the assessing gaze of someone who'd spent years evaluating people. "What is your job, exactly? DEO? Independent? Something else?"
"I help people." Mon-El shrugged. "That's the job."
"Simple answer."
"Simple truth."
She almost smiled. "Fair enough. Thanks for the assist. Try not to damage any more buildings than necessary."
"I'll do my best."
---
The rest of the week blurred together.
Tuesday: A fire in a residential building. Mon-El carried eight people to safety while firefighters worked to contain the blaze. Two of them were children who'd been trapped on the third floor, smoke inhalation already beginning to affect their breathing. He'd gotten them to paramedics in time, but it was close.
Wednesday: A multi-car pileup on the interstate. Supergirl handled the overturned tanker truck while Valor extracted victims from crushed vehicles. His TK allowed him to peel back metal that would have required heavy machinery, cutting rescue time in half.
Thursday: A mugging intervention in the arts district. Three teenagers cornering a woman in an alley, knives out, bad intentions clear. Mon-El had dropped from above, disarmed them without injury, and stayed to make sure the woman got home safely. She'd cried on his shoulder the whole way, and he'd let her.
Friday: Nothing. A quiet day where the city seemed to take a collective breath. Mon-El spent it training at the DEO, honing his TK field control, pushing the limits of what he could lift and manipulate and protect.
Through it all, a pattern emerged.
The news stopped calling him "Supergirl's partner" or "the Daxamite hero." The headlines said "Valor" now—his name, his identity, standing on its own merits. CatCo ran a feature piece titled "Valor's First Week," chronicling his rescues with the kind of attention usually reserved for established heroes.
People recognized him on the street. Not just civilians—other heroes, too. A speedster from Coast City sent a message through DEO channels, welcoming him to the community. Someone who called themselves "The Guardian" apparently wanted to coordinate on an unrelated matter.
He was becoming part of something larger. A network of protectors, each with their own territories and responsibilities, all working toward the same goal.
---
The sleep schedule became a problem almost immediately.
"Three AM," Kara said, staring at the breakfast spread she'd assembled from their refrigerator's meager contents. "We're eating breakfast at three AM."
"Technically, it's early morning." Mon-El poured himself a glass of juice—orange, fresh, one of his favorite Earth discoveries. "We could call this a pre-dawn snack."
"We could call it a disaster." She bit into a piece of toast with the aggression of someone who hadn't slept properly in days. "This schedule is unsustainable."
"We're adapting."
"We're exhausted."
He couldn't argue with that. The demands of patrol coverage meant staggered schedules, one of them always watching while the other rested. In theory, it worked. In practice, they kept waking each other up, kept finding reasons to stay up together, kept prioritizing connection over sleep.
"Maybe we need a rotation," Mon-El suggested. "Set days when each of us takes the night shift."
"We tried that. You took night shift Monday, I took Tuesday, and by Wednesday we were both awake at midnight eating ice cream and watching nature documentaries."
"The documentaries were educational."
"The documentaries were an excuse." She sighed, setting down her toast. "I'm not complaining. I like spending time with you. I just wish we could do it during normal hours."
"Normal is overrated." He moved around the counter, wrapping his arms around her from behind. "We're superheroes. Our lives are inherently abnormal."
"That's not an argument."
"It's an observation." He kissed her temple. "We'll figure it out. We always do."
They finished breakfast—or whatever the meal was called at three in the morning—and watched the city through the windows. Lights flickered across National City, signs of life even at this hour. Somewhere out there, people were sleeping soundly because heroes were watching over them.
That mattered. Whatever the cost to their sleep schedules, that mattered.
---
By the end of the week, something had shifted.
Not dramatically—not a transformation or revelation—but a settling. Mon-El understood his place now in a way he hadn't before. He was Valor. He was Supergirl's partner. He was a hero in his own right, earning trust through action rather than inherited title.
The symbol from the alien community now hung in their apartment, a reminder of what he'd chosen and who he'd become. His father's ring rested against his chest, connecting him to a past that had shaped him without defining him.
He landed on the balcony Saturday evening, muscles pleasantly tired from a day of patrols. Kara was already there, watching the sunset paint the sky in shades of orange and gold.
"Good week?" she asked.
Mon-El considered everything that had happened—the rescues, the recognition, the slow process of becoming someone new. The grief was still there, buried beneath purpose. The uncertainty remained. But so did something else: hope.
"The best," he said.
She smiled, took his hand, and together they watched the sun disappear below the horizon.
Tomorrow would bring new challenges. New threats. New opportunities to prove himself worthy of the name he'd chosen.
But tonight, there was just this: two heroes at rest, holding hands on a balcony, grateful for the world they'd fought to protect.
It was, Mon-El realized, exactly where he wanted to be.
Note:
Please give good reviews and power stones itrings more people and more people means more chapters?
My Patreon is all about exploring 'What If' timelines, and you can get instant access to chapters far ahead of the public release.
Choose your journey:
Timeline Viewer ($6): Get 10 chapters of early access + 5 new chapters weekly.
Timeline Explorer ($9): Jump 15-20 chapters ahead of everyone.
Timeline Keeper ($15): Get Instant Access to chapters the moment I finish writing them. No more waiting.
Read the raw, unfiltered story as it unfolds. Your support makes this possible!
👉 Find it all at patreon.com/Whatif0