Supergirl's expression was especially vivid this time, perhaps because it was the first time she had widened her eyes like that today. Her mouth opened slightly, but in the end she still could not summon the courage to ask the question on her mind.
"Next book. I'll definitely add you in the next one, Aunt Kara. The story of Wonder Woman and Supergirl that simply must be told. I think the American market would respond very enthusiastically to that."
Ian did not want to disappoint his relative, so he gave Kara what he considered a deeply heartfelt promise.
However,
the Kryptonian girl's face instantly turned deathly pale.
"I think I'm still a little too unknown for that. Not suitable. Definitely not suitable..."
Kara waved both hands frantically, and there was even a trace of panic in her eyes.
"Let's talk about why you actually came to find me. Did you make some huge mess at home and run here so your parents couldn't punish you?"
Kara desperately changed the subject.
From the bottom of her heart, she felt that with Ian's personality, plus the diagnosis written on that paper, even if he had caused an even bigger disaster, she probably still would not have been that shocked.
"The truth is actually the exact opposite. My dad's the one who got into serious trouble, and that forced someone as careful as me to step up and help him."
Ian walked toward the open kitchen.
His eyes were fixed only on Kara's large refrigerator. The chicken and fries from earlier had been high in calories, but they still had not fully satisfied the hunger and energy deficit caused by using Regenerative Surge.
"Talk like a normal person."
Kara sighed tiredly.
"Be serious and tell me the truth... if you still want my help."
She watched as Ian opened the refrigerator and took out a food container.
"That is the truth, Aunt Kara. Your dear cousin is dying, and we're the only ones who can save him."
For once, Ian spoke in a low, serious tone.
Of course,
his seriousness did not last even three seconds. Very soon he lowered his head, opened the lunch box, sniffed it, frowned slightly, hesitated for a moment, and still stuffed two big bites of the chicken breast into his mouth.
"Ptooey, ptooey!"
He had only chewed twice before immediately spitting it back out.
"It's spoiled!"
He rushed to the sink and rinsed his mouth repeatedly, regretting that when he first smelled the sourness, he had not limited himself to only a tiny taste. Hunger really did affect his judgment too much.
"This is what you meant when you said there was still food upstairs?"
The boy wiped his mouth and delivered the soul-deep question.
"..."
Kara suddenly felt awkward beyond words.
"Maybe I left it sitting a little too long..."
She hurried over to the refrigerator and stopped Ian from pulling more things out.
"Actually, some of this stuff might have been in here for... maybe a few weeks?"
"Definitely no more than sixty days. I only moved in here sixty days ago."
Kara deeply regretted her lack of good habits, although for most people that sort of regret was only temporary.
Once the awkwardness passed,
their habits tended to remain exactly the same.
"Are you sure you're a girl?"
Ian felt as though his idealized image of women had shattered.
"Well... it's fermented food. You just don't understand. Since you can't appreciate delicately fermented cuisine, I'll just take you out for fried chicken later."
The excuse Kara came up with was truly pathetic.
"..."
This time it was Ian's turn to be speechless.
"You call this food?"
He grabbed a few more pieces of chicken breast out of the container he had already taken out. A few of the top pieces still looked almost intact, but the ones underneath had already started leaking greenish liquid.
"It's not attacking anyone's taste buds anymore. It's attacking the health insurance card of anyone who eats it!"
Ian was someone who could calmly take a few bites out of an evil spirit just to test the flavor.
Even he found this impossible to accept.
Chicken breast already tasted awful before it spoiled. Even in good condition, it was something you only tolerated. Now that it had gone bad, the flavor in his mouth was like a thick blend of old sweat and a urine-soaked utility pole.
"Enough with all that. Let's talk about your father. You don't seem worried at all."
This was already the fourth or fifth time Kara had forcefully changed the subject today.
Still, it really was the important issue. Kara still felt deeply suspicious of Ian's story. After all, there were not many things on Earth that could truly threaten Superman's life. Every time something dangerous enough to threaten Superman appeared, it was usually some planet-ending disaster, and she felt there was no way she would have missed something like that.
"Of course I'm worried, just not that worried. This is only day two, and I've already gotten very close to the truth. With seven full days, I don't even know how I'm supposed to... fine, let's talk about my father."
Ian noticed Kara's expression and stopped wandering off-topic again.
After organizing his thoughts,
he laid out the relevant events from beginning to end in detail.
About ten minutes later,
Kara had more or less grasped the full picture from his explanation. The problem was that after hearing everything Ian had "been through," she was even more convinced he might be having some kind of episode.
"So..."
Before speaking, Kara actually had to take a deep breath. Her voice came out as though squeezed through clenched teeth.
"You're telling me that you met some cosmic-level god who is completely, hopelessly in love with you, and that's why she risked breaking the rules to secretly tell you how to save your father?"
Honestly, it was hard to blame Kara for not believing him.
The whole plot sounded absurd.
"Mm. There's been a little artistic embellishment, not much. But broadly speaking, that's what happened."
Ian sat across from her on the sofa, his expression serious and unwavering.
After hearing that,
Kara fell into a long silence.
Her eyes moved back and forth across Ian's face, trying to find even the slightest flaw in that innocent-looking expression.
She could not tell.
She genuinely could not tell.
Was this nephew of hers having some kind of episode, or had something this outrageously bizarre really happened?
And just as Kara's brain started buzzing, making her feel like she was about to slip into some reality-breaking mental state of her own,
Ian suddenly pulled a military knife out of his pocket.
Kara's eyes widened instantly.
"Wait..."
Her warning was not even halfway out
before Ian drove the knife straight toward his own heart without the slightest hesitation.
Slash.
Kara turned into a blur. Kryptonian speed ripped a brief sonic burst through the air. Her hand clamped down hard on the blade, and the metal groaned under the strain in her grip.
"What are you doing?!"
Kara was still shaken.
Her voice came out almost like a shout, and she looked like an angry cat with every hair standing on end.
"I'm proving to you that my father really is on the brink of death, and that there really is some big shot trying to save him. Also, now that I've eaten and drunk enough, I was hoping to take this chance to exploit that big shot's loophole again while I was at it."
Ian tried to shove the knife deeper into his own chest, only to discover that no matter how much force he used, the blade refused to move. The gap in raw strength between him and Supergirl was just too enormous.
"Aunt Kara, you're blocking my path to greatness."
In the end, Ian could only try to persuade her to move.
Instead, Kara's expression changed, and she crushed the military knife in her hand.
The blade shattered into several pieces in the grip of the girl who looked slender and soft.
"I'll go investigate this with you right now. Is that enough?!"
Kara took a deep breath, her chest rising and falling sharply. She suspected Ian really was having some kind of episode, but no matter what, the first thing she needed to do was take him back to Metropolis.
"Perfect!"
Ian bounced up from the sofa.
"What are you doing?"
Watching Ian walk straight toward her and then suddenly spring into the air, Kara went numb.
Still, once she reminded herself that he was just a troubled kid, she could only swallow her frustration.
Then she shot toward the window.
Supergirl took flight.
And Ian... Ian climbed onto Supergirl's back and took off with her.
"So this is what flying feels like!"
Ian gripped Kara's hair with both hands, feeling the wind brush across his face. His yearning to unlock the profession tied to Homelander only grew stronger.
"Can you please show your aunt a little respect? I know which direction to fly. You do not need to yank my hair to steer me!"
Kara had never felt this exhausted in her life.
But she was the older one.
What else could she do?
All she could manage was a few irritated scoldings.
Unfortunately, Ian's way of thinking was something she truly could not grasp.
"Hyah! Hyah!"
Ian was no longer trying to guide her by the hair.
Unfortunately, hearing those sounds behind her and feeling herself get kicked at the waist made Kara think she actually preferred the hair-pulling.
"Can you calm down for..."
Kara's exhausted complaint had barely made it halfway out
when her super-hearing caught something unusual in the distance.
"A plane's going down!"
Kara jerked into a hard turn and changed direction instantly. Ian looked up and saw a passenger jet trailing black smoke, descending at a dangerously steep angle.
"Another plane accident? That's way too frequent. One happened yesterday too!"
Ian could not help frowning. He had already started wondering whether there was some hidden conspiracy behind all this.
Could this be the beginning of some major event?
The more Ian thought about it, the more it felt like he had stepped straight into a season of nonstop trouble.
However,
"How is that frequent? That's normal."
Kara sounded completely calm.
Clearly, she had a lot of experience rescuing planes.
"Boeing's just like that."
The matter-of-fact tone in her voice, and the genuine confusion she showed at Ian finding this unusual, hit him like a psychic attack.
"..."
For once, it was Ian's turn to be completely silenced.
He had no words of rebuttal at all.
(End of Chapter)
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