If you had asked Courtney Whitmore to predict where one might find a temple devoted to the worship of a sun god, she would probably have made some smartass remark about the Great Ziggurat of Ur, about which she'd read in Mr. Hall's history class. She would certainly not have suggested that you try looking in the basement of a mixed-use commercial building in the Millrace district of New Avalon. That was the kind of place a person of Courtney's age and general persuasion would expect to find a sushi bar, or maybe a rave. Certainly not a sun temple. I mean, in the basement? Hello!

And yet, that was exactly where she was, in both senses of the phrase. In the basement of a mixed-use commercial building in the Millrace; and in a sun temple.

Mind you, it wasn't her sun temple. Like most 25th-century human who could trace their primary ancestry back to Earth, Courtney subscribed to no particular religion, beyond a vague acknowledgement that there had to be something greater than individual mortals out there. She found the view of the ancient Jedi Knights, their all- encompassing but curiously non-judgmental Force, interesting, or at least more comforting than the often vengeful anthropomorphic gods with which her own species had grappled for most of its sapient career.

What she'd heard about the religion to which this particular temple was devoted was also interesting, though it struck Courtney as a little too specific for her to get much out of it herself. She stopped just inside the entrance, moving to one side of the doorway, and looked around in silence as the friend she'd come with entered the sanctuary.

It didn't look much like traditional Earth churches, like the one Courtney's cousin Wilda had gotten married in a few years ago. In her limited experience, those tended to be long, narrow rectangular rooms filled with ranks of high-backed benches, all focused on a raised area with an altar and an image of the deity in question at one end. This was a circular room with a domed ceiling, not particularly big or grand, and its decor was very sparse. In fact, it couldn't be said to have any, beyond a subtle decorative coaming around the rim of the dome. It had benches, too, but these were backless - simple black alloy platforms, a thing to sit on and no more - and arranged not in rows, but in concentric rings. The focus of this room was clearly toward the center.

In the center of the room was a big floor-mounted holoprojector, of the kind often seen in military briefing rooms on TV. It was maybe five feet in diameter, recessed slightly into the floor, and above it floated a fully three-dimensional, true-color hologram. And here, at least, was a similarity with Earth churches, because this was certainly an image of the deity, if you wanted to call it that, to which the temple was consecrated,and it utterly dominated the room. Glowing in brilliant true-color holography, filling the temple with a beautiful blood-red light (Courtney supposed the walls, floor, and ceiling were white, but she couldn't say for certain), it was instantly recognizable to anyone with moderate education as a red star, though without scale references, it wasn't immediately apparent whether it was a dwarf or giant.

From context, of course, the answer was obvious. This was a red giant star - indeed, a very specific one. It was the star which, until it had blown itself to pieces in the year 2005, the planet Krypton had orbited.

Its name, and the name of the ancient Kryptonian sun god it had inspired, was Rao.

Kara Zor-El sat down on the innermost of the rings of benches, hands on knees, and raised her eyes to the image of her dead homeworld's primary. (One did not bow one's head in the presence of Rao; that would, in effect, constitute spurning its gift of light.)

Great Rao, she said silently, thank you for sheltering and nurturing the Krypto'saii through the millennia it took us to grow strong and wise. Know that we did not leave your light willingly, and that you are always in our hearts. Please watch over those who perished with Krypton and know that they are not forgotten.

Then, with the standard, formal (if no less heartfelt) prayer out of the way, she added, I ask that you maintain your eternal vigil over my father and mother, Zor-El and Alura, who were among the last to perish within your sight; and my uncle and aunt, Jor-El and Lara, who were murdered far from your loving gaze.

I ask that you take notice of my lost cousin Kal-El, wherever he may be, and know that I think of him with love and hope.

I ask that you watch over me and my friends, though they are not Krypto'saii, and give us always the courage to fight against evil.

I ask that you give me the strength and the wisdom to confront the renegade Dru-Zod and bring him to justice for his crimes when next we meet.

Kara remained motionless after completing her requests, keeping her eyes on the ever-shifting face of Rao for a few more seconds. Then she rose, fished in a pocket for a second, and plugged a few coins into a paystation at the end of the bench.

Her business apparently finished, Kara spread her open hands before Rao in a sort of unbowing obeisance, then turned and walked back out of the ring of benches toward the door.

"All set?" Courtney asked, her voice hushed slightly, as one does in a church.

Kara nodded. "Thanks for coming with. I figured since we were in the neighborhood anyway... "

As they climbed the stairs back to street level, Courtney patted Kara's shoulder. "Hey," she said, "compared to the Catholic Mass I had to sit through at my cousin's wedding, that was nothing. Besides, I kind of find the whole thing fascinating."

Kara turned a questioning look to her friend as they emerged onto the sidewalk in front of the building. "Fascinating how?"

"Well... " Courtney considered her response. "I never met a real live Kryptonian before you, so I didn't know much about the culture. But they - you - have a reputation for being such a rational people, I'd never have thought of you worshipping a sun god. It seems kind of... tribal. No offense," she added hastily. "I think it's cool, just... not what I was expecting."

"We don't really worship Rao as a god," Kara said. "Not for a long time. It's more that Rao is the face we put on the wonders of the universe."

"Come again?"

"Well, look. Thousands of years ago, we were like any other civilization, right? We did worship our sun as a god. That's what most sapients do on planets with visible suns. Even the Vulcans reverenced a sun god at one point in their distant past. It's just that most of them drift away from the idea during their early eras of scientific inquiry. Once they figure out that the sun is a giant thermonuclear reaction rather than some kind of all-powerful thinking being, that pretty much wraps it up for their sun gods."

Courtney nodded. "Right. That's exactly what I mean."

Kara grinned. "Well, on Krypton, when we figured out what Rao really is, we thought about it for a while, said, 'Huh. That's even more wondrous and cosmic than we thought,' rearranged the seating, and carried on. I mean, it's not like we sincerely believe that our sun is a sapience that will hear and answer our prayers; it's more of a metaphor. And sapient or not, it is still responsible for our existence as lifeforms. No Rao, no Krypto'saii. So we have a great respect and... fondness for it. Even though none of us live under its light any longer."

They began descending again, this time into an N station. "Where does the image they use in the temples come from?" Courtney wondered.

"There's a ring of survey satellites in orbit around the sun," Kara said. "They were originally used to monitor Rao's stability - it's a red giant, after all, and some of our scientists thought that would be a problem long before Krypton's core would ever collapse. It was only after they were in place that someone realized their visual sensors could be coordinated to produce a real-time image for the temples. Before that, they usually had a model. The one in the central temple in Kryptopolis was made from 300 tons of bronzium. I heard they were planning to take it to New Krypton, but I don't know if they managed it or not."

"That's cool. Maybe we should go see someday. My mom's got a Bottle City of Kandor from a trip she took there before I was born." They boarded a train heading downtown. "She says it's really nice."

Kara nodded. "Yeah... one of these days," she said, but she seemed to have something else on her mind.

Courtney sensed the sudden preoccupation and decided she'd asked enough questions for one day. She had to remind herself occasionally that, though Krypton's destruction was ancient history from her perspective, from Kara's point of view it had happened only a few months ago. She couldn't expect the wound to be entirely healed yet.

"Tosci's?" she said instead.

Kara seemed to come back from some distance away, looked at her friend, and smirked. "You even have to ask if I'm up for ice cream?"

It wasn't until early that evening, after Courtney headed home to see what her mother and stepfather were up to and Kara flew out to Titans Tower, that Kara found her thoughts returning to the matter that had occurred to her earlier. It was something Courtney had said that put her onto the track, though not directly, and it wasn't anything anyone said that got her thinking about it again.

She stood on the observation balcony on the upper level of the Titans Tower gym and watched while two of her friends and colleagues fought. Technically, Robin and Batgirl were sparring, not fighting, but the distinction was unusually academic where those two were concerned. To an untrained eye - and Kara's qualified, after only a month of crimefighting alongside them - it tended to look more like the two Gotham expatriates were seriously trying to kill each other with their bare hands.

Kara watched them go at each other with nearly full force for several minutes and marveled at their skill, their athleticism, and their sheer audacity. That last part always struck her when she watched either of them in action, really. Neither one had any superpowers. Batgirl came close - her powers of perception and battlefield awareness were arguably paranormal, and in any case damned creepy - but physically she was still only human. Neither of them ever let that stop them. She'd seen both go up against opponents who were their physical betters many times over, hurling themselves into battle without a second thought, and emerge victorious.

Far from feeling superior because of the astonishing abilities yellow Zeta Cygni's light bestowed upon her, as General Zod had once predicted she would, Kara felt profoundly humbled by "ordinary" people like Batgirl and Robin. It amazed and disturbed her that Zod and his minions could be so shallow and arrogant as to think that an accident of xenogenetics made them better than humans simply because it made them stronger than humans...

... but that was rather beside the point right now.

Kara waited for the sparring match to end, wondering with an idle smile whether Batgirl would kiss Robin as a sort of closing move. Sometimes she did that, and sometimes she didn't - just to keep the Boy Wonder on his toes, apparently.

Today she didn't, which was just as well. It wouldn't really have set the proper tone for the conversation Kara wanted to have with her afterward.

When she emerged from the showers a few minutes later, Batgirl had traded her black costume for nondescript civvies and become regular old Cassandra Cain again, although in practical terms all that meant was that it would take her two seconds to get out her grapple gun instead of one. She had most of her gear in a duffel bag over her shoulder.

Cassie paused as she saw Kara waiting for her in the darkened gym; apparently Robin had finished showering first and killed the lights on his way out, knowing Cassie wouldn't care about the dark. She wondering what to make of the Kryptonian's presence. She didn't really know Kara all that well. They were teammates - Cassie would even go so far as to call them friends, which wasn't something she did lightly - but they didn't really hang out. That didn't bother Cassie any; she saw it as a natural state of affairs. Kara was a creature of the day and she preferred the night. Outside of Titans business, Cassie wouldn't expect their lives to overlap much.

"Hi," she said, leaving her question unasked.

"Hi," Kara replied. "Listen, uh... do you have a minute? I have... well... I want to ask a favor."

Cassie considered this for a moment, then shrugged. "Sure," she said. "I'm headed back to town. You can explain on the way."

Kara brightened. "Do you have the sub?"

Cassie smiled. "You can fly," she said, "and you're impressed by the Batsub?"

"When I was in school, I spent a semester at the seahab at the edge of the continental shelf outside Kryptopolis Harbor," Kara explained as they entered the elevator together. "Getting permission to solo the minisubs was one of the rites of passage."

They chatted like that during the short trip across from Pérez Island to the underground submarine pen adjoining Batgirl's miniature crimefighting headquarters, Batcave jr., and though Cassie knew there was something on Kara's mind, she didn't press until they arrived.

"Okay," she said when they'd finished tying up the Batsub alongside the dock. "Come on in. I'm going to make some cup-o'-shyam and you're going to tell me what's bugging you."

Kara blushed slightly. "Okay."

It took her only a few minutes to make her request and explaining the reasoning behind it; she finished just as the photonic oven in Cassie's cave-corner kitchenette dinged. Frowning slightly in thought, Cassie got up from her chair, retrieved the styrofoam cup from the oven, dug around in the utensil drawer until she located a mini-hoop, and returned to her seat, stirring the noodles.

"Hmm," she said. "That could be tricky." Then she smiled. "But I do love a challenge."

"Then you'll do it?" Kara asked.

"Give me a few days to look into it," Cassie replied. "I think we can at least give it a shot."

Kara stood in front of the building and wondered if she had the right address. Not only could she not think of any particular reason why her appointment should be in Elstree, a western suburb of New Avalon known for leafy streets of quiet houses, the building she was in front of appeared to be a warehouse, which wasn't what she'd have expected of the neighborhood or the occasion. Moreover, it was a warehouse that apparently, if the sign above the door was to be believed, belonged to a visual effects company.

She knocked, but there was no answer, so she opened the door and stepped inside.

The interior of the warehouse was almost entirely bare. There were no stacks of crates, no pallets, no forklifts - in short, she thought with a mental smirk, no wares. The place was empty except for a small room carved out of one corner with prefab wall segments. Everything else was just a bare concrete floor, a two-story-high ceiling studded with glowstrips and barrel-shaped lamps (only the former of which were turned on), and empty space between.

Cassie Cain was standing in the exact center of the room, arms folded, waiting. She was wearing her Batgirl costume, sans the cape and mask, which were hanging on a hook on one wall of the little room in the corner.

"Uh... hi," said Kara, her voice echoing in the empty space.

"Not what you expected, huh," Cassie replied with a faint smile. "Best I could do on short notice."

"Does this building really belong to M5 Industries?" Kara asked as she walked toward the center.

Cassie nodded. "Adam and Jamie found my challenge intriguing. Is that what you're going to wear?"

Kara looked down at herself. She had on basic warmup clothes and sneakers, nothing fancy. "Sure. Why?"

"You're more likely to be wearing your costume when the time comes," Cassie replied. "But we can get into that later. Cape handling is an advanced skill anyway," she added with that same little wry smile.

Then she sobered, her face becoming entirely serious, and she took a couple of steps toward Kara. "Listen. Before we do this, I have to be absolutely certain you know what you're getting into. This is going to hurt. It's probably going to hurt a lot. You're not used to things hurting."

Kara's jaw jutted slightly. "I'm not afraid, if that's what you're getting at."

Cassie shook her head. "No, I wouldn't expect you to be. Not yet. You don't have the sense to be afraid yet." It seemed like a remark intended to be humorous, but not the way she delivered it.

"I've been hurt, Cassie. General Zod beat the stang out of me. That's why I'm here. Why I asked you to help me. Because I want to know how to defend myself when I'm not stronger, not faster, not invulnerable. So that when Zod comes back - and he will come back - I can do something about it."

Cassie regarded her for a moment, then nodded solemnly. She reached to her utility belt and pressed a button.

With a loud CLUNK, the barrel lights in the ceiling came on and filled the warehouse with green light.

Kara blinked, more surprised than affected for the first second or so; then she crumpled to hands and knees, fighting an urge to throw up. With an effort she raised her head and stared wide-eyed at her teammate, shock written on her face.

"You were expecting red-sun lamps," Cassie observed. Still stunned, Kara nodded. "They don't work fast enough. These take effect instantly, and when they're turned off you'll recover your full strength a lot quicker. We can't have a half-strength Supergirl trying to protect the city... "

"These... will... kill me," Kara gasped, but Cassie shook her head again.

"You just feel that way because of the initial shock. It's not real kryptonite radiation. Adam and Jamie developed it from that fake kryptonite the IPO's been working on. Now come on, get up. Let's get started. I told you this was going to hurt."

Kara gathered herself for a moment, every instinct in her body screaming at her to flee, get out of here, get away from this crazy bitch and her kryptonite-chamber warehouse - who the hell thought this was a good idea anyway -

- and pushed it all down, calming herself with an act of will.

This was your idea, sunshine, she told herself. Now buck up and get with the program. Cassie's not going to kill you. Sure, she scares the hell out of you, and that's when you have your superpowers and you don't feel like you're going to throw up and start bleeding from both eyes... but she's a hero... and she's your friend. Now get up.

Get

up.

She pushed herself upright, then got slowly to her feet. Now that the initial wave of nausea and fright had passed, she did feel stronger than she should've under this kind of exposure. There was no way she'd ever be able to stand up under her own power in the presence of so much k-rad.

"Okay? Ready?" Cassie asked.

Kara nodded. "Rea- " she said, but before she could finish, Cassie had leaped across the space between them and kicked her in the side of the head, sending her sprawling.

The next half-hour went no better.

"Look," Cassie said as Kara dragged herself to her feet for the nth time, "we don't have to do this. I feel like a sadist. Seriously. You're making me feel like my mother, and that's never a good thing." She looked thoughtfully up at the ceiling. "Maybe the PK lamps are set too high... "

Kara took a couple of deep breaths, wiping a trickle of blood from the corner of her mouth.

"I think... I'm getting... used to it," she said.

Cassie considered that, looking unconvinced.

"You can stop me any time you like," she warned, "but I'm not going to ask again."

Kara's only response was to unzip her warmup jacket and toss it away.

"If I learn to fight... through this," she said, "so much the better."

Cassie gave her a long, hard look, then smiled ever so slightly.

"Good," she said. Then she darted in again, brushed aside Kara's clumsy attempt at a defense, and launched a full-power punch at her head. The Kryptonian could see it coming, knew she wasn't going to be able to do anything about it other than get hit... but she didn't flinch.

And the blow didn't land.

"Very good," said Cassie, opening her hand to give Kara a gentle pat on the cheek. "You're ready."

"Ready for what?" Kara asked, looking puzzled.

"Ready to start," Cassie replied.

"Start? What was all that about if we hadn't started?"

"You said you were ready," said Cassie. "I had to know... if you were right." She backed up a few paces, facing Kara, and told her, "This isn't going to be like you've seen in the movies. I'm not going to pass on to you what I was taught before you. I was taught to murder people. It's not pretty, but it's the truth. What I'm going to teach you... is how to stop people like me." She gave her little wry smile again. "That seems more in keeping with your personality."

Kara gave her a wondering look for a moment, then smiled slightly and nodded.

"I get it," she said.

"Okay. Let's start from the beginning, then. The system I'm going to show you is called jitkyundou... "

"That Which Does Not Kill Us" - a Future Imperfect Mini-Story by Benjamin D. Hutchins
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© 2008 Eyrie Productions, Unlimited