1. The Trip of a Lifetime

Kara pressed her face against the window of the plane taking in as much of the breathtaking sight as possible. Thousands of feet below, the tumultuous, deep blue sea disappeared to be replaced by a canopy of green trees that reached higher than any forest Kara had ever seen. Small towns and bustling villages dotted the country and Kara strived to catch a glimpse of all of them. The excitement buzzing through her body had made sleeping on the plane almost impossible and had kept her leg bouncing nervously throughout the whole flight.

This trip was a big deal.

And an even bigger opportunity.

This trip had the potential to make Kara’s career as a journalist.

“Kara, weigh in on this.” Kara dragged her gaze away from the small porthole to face the seats in front of her where Winn had lifted his head up over the back of his chair to get her attention.

“On what?” Kara asked with a tilt of her head.

James’ head suddenly popped up above the seat next to Winn and said with an exasperated tone, “That we are not in any danger on this trip.”

Kara sighed and shook her head, “Theonia has been stable for almost two years now, we are perfectly safe.”

“Sure, explain that to the heavily armed and dangerous soldiers waiting for us upon arrival.” Winn replied with wide, almost manic eyes.

“Winn…”, Kara groaned out in frustration.

Kara understood where Winn was coming from. Really, she did.

However, she had experienced this exact same conversation everyday with her sister, sometimes twice daily if Alex phoned her before work. The weeks before flying out, Alex had even insisted on teaching her self-defence in the most intense way possible.

Kara was eventually forced to put her foot down when her sister began running ‘surprise’ drills causing Kara to become a flailing mess of limbs whenever someone so much as stepped up behind her. This jumpiness had gotten so bad that she had accidentally broken two different co-worker’s noses on the same day. Cat Grant had to forcibly send her home when other media outlets began to report on the two seperate ambulances that had attended the offices.

“Think about it like this…”, James, ever the mediator, began soothingly, “at least with soldiers around someone might be able to protect you from Kara’s fists of fury.”

Kara let out a despondent sigh, slumping down in her seat, whilst Winn’s hands shot up protectively to cover his still slightly swollen nose. “How was I supposed to know she would react to a surprise hug like that?!” Winn whined pathetically.

“I told you multiple times!” Kara argued back, her hand flapping wildly alongside her words causing Winn to duck down in fear.

“Also, Snapper had literally just been driven off in the back of an ambulance…”, James commented thoughtfully, shooting Kara a small smile before dropping down to join Winn who he had successfully distracted from his original train of thought.

Kara shook her head in amusement at James’ tactics, reaching underneath the seat in front of her to pull out her laptop with the intent to read over her copious notes for probably the thousandth time promising that she could look back out at the picturesque view after one more read-through of the economic background of the country.

The island of Theonia had been more or less completely isolated from the rest of the world for the last two centuries, only interacting with the wider world in the most basic of trades. The country was almost entirely self-sufficient, producing all of its own food and materials without needing to depend on other nations. It’s main export was precious minerals that seemed to be in abundance below the green forests that made up the majority of the environment. These valuable commodities hidden below the surface and only sparingly mined to protect the well-loved forests had led to numerous invasion attempts over the last few hundred years, all of which had been successfully repelled by the country’s citizens. These attempts, though, had resulted in the island becoming extremely closed off and stoic, choosing to maintain tradition at all times, going so far as to continue with a monarchy rather than make the shift to a democracy like the majority of the world.

No foreign journalist had stepped foot on the island in a quarter of a century.

That would all change today.

Today marked the beginning of Theonia’s move to open up it’s borders and embrace the rest of the world.

This dramatic shift in policy and tradition followed an horrific series of events that the rest of world actually knew very little about. The wider world had received only the most primitive pieces of information and the occasional snippets of knowledge to construct a narrative for what had happened.

King Lionel, who had ruled the country with a detached interest in his people, died under mysterious circumstances ten years ago resulting in his young son, Lex, ascending the throne on his twenty-first birthday. King Lex was loved in the beginning of his reign but as time passed, he struggled to maintain control of his people due to his failure to connect and understand his citizens, he began to shift into something cruel. The country became more militaristic, the army being deployed throughout the nation to keep the population docile. Years passed and Lex’s reign turned truly tyrannical.

Violence was used freely against protests.

Public executions became a normal part of everyday life.

The forests that had been under royal protection for years were destroyed to enable the construction of multiple mines, which Lex forced his people to work in on a wage that they could barely survive on.

Attempts to interfere from other countries backfired massively and resulted in numerous civilian casualties.

That’s when the island went into complete lockdown. It was as if the mute button had been pressed on the entire population.

A whole country turning off the lights and pretending they weren’t home.

No information, not even a single piece of news escaped the island.

That was until two years ago.

Two years ago, the UN received a simple missive stating King Lex was dead and that his younger, and nearly completely unknown, sister Lena had ascended to the throne as a figurehead akin to the British royal family, as the country was undergoing a seemingly successful transformation into a democracy.

The entire world went crazy with the news.

Every media outlet on the planet clamoured and begged to be given the chance to enter the country and get the first shot of the Queen, and find out the full story of the events that had resulted in this seismic political shift. All attempts to enter the country failed miserably. The world was forced to wait with bated breath for the next morsel of news.

Six months after Theonia had released its initial statement, a second one followed revealing that J’onn J’onzz would be the first ever democratically elected prime minister. Following this Theonia opened up to the UN, inviting extremely select officials to the country to begin the process of becoming a part of the international organisation. A year later the country had finally begun to settle into its new political landscape and was now welcoming a whole cohort of press to come, visit and find out what the country was really like.

Catco had fought hard to get as many of the illustrious and rare invites as possible, eventually managing to get three places on the plane to make up their reporting team. James easily gained one of the spots what with being the unequivocally best photojournalist in the whole company. Likewise, Winn’s technical ability and the speed he could get a story online even in the most remote of locations made him the next obvious choice, especially when they were competing with an entire plane full of other journalists to get information out first. Kara had hoped and prayed for the final spot, but had presumed that it would go to a more experienced or more well-known reporter. The day Cat Grant had strolled into her office, told her to pack her bags and not let her down had been the one of the happiest days of Kara’s life.

“This seat taken?”

Kara barely resisted rolling her eyes upon recognising the smarmy tone of her former co-worker Mike Matthews. She turned to face the pretty boy television reporter for LYNX News who was already slipping into the empty aisle seat beside her. “Why did you even bother to ask?” Kara questioned as Mike shot her his own version of a charming grin.

“Oh, don’t be like that, Kar.” Mike replied with a disappointed shake of his head.

Kara hated the nickname ‘Kar’.

Everyone else managed to perfectly easily call her by her name so she just couldn’t comprehend how Mike could struggle so much with the extra syllable. Pushing down the flare of anger, Kara decided her best course of action was to ignore him until he got bored and left her to her work. She could feel his eyes on her and it produced a distinct feeling of discomfort in the pit of her stomach, especially when he leant forward into her personal space to look at her typed up notes on the screen of her laptop.

“The national bird of Theonia is the Skylark.” Mike muttered, reading over her shoulder. “Getting a bit caught up in the details aren’t we?”

Kara quickly slammed down the lid of her laptop, a harsh frown settling on her face as she snapped back, “Some of us actually take our job seriously and want our readers to feel like they are being informed by someone who has actually done the research.”

Kara loathed Mike Matthews, which was an incredible achievement on Mike’s part as it takes considerable amount of effort for Kara to even slightly dislike anyone. She wouldn’t even say she disliked Snapper, who was the single most critical person Kara had ever met, she would merely say that they had very different perspectives on… everything.

But Kara loathed Mike.  

And she had good reason to.

Mike had been a friend by association from college who, upon hearing about Kara’s recent promotion to newbie journalist at CatCo, had begged for her help in getting a job. Kara had recommended him, putting her neck and reputation on the line for him as he had promised to not let her down. Mike had quickly excelled at the social media aspect of the work, getting a significant following online due to his charm and good looks.

Issue was none of his work had any substance, some even had major factual inaccuracies.

Kara, unable to resist supporting a struggling friend, helped him with the majority of his workload. Mike’s reputation skyrocketed through taking credit for Kara’s efforts. He repaid Kara’s kindness by hitting on her at all times of the day, spreading rumours that they were in a relationship and that he was the one providing guidance to her instead of the other way around. Just when Kara had reached the end of her patience, Mike quit out of the blue leaving CatCo in the lurch and took a job for the superficial, fear mongering LYNX news conglomeration. Since moving company, Mike had repeatedly made digs online at CatCo, and continued to act as if there was nothing wrong with how he acted.    

“Harsh.” Mike pouted in an attempt to be endearing, “You know you could really benefit from taking a break… relaxing...” Mike placed his hand atop of Kara’s and met her gaze with twinkling eyes, “Maybe I could be of assistance in that department, help you blow off some steam...”

Kara forced a mocking smile, “Wow, you’re ability to retain and then stubbornly ignore the same information over and over again is outstanding.” The twinkle left Mike’s eyes and a crease appeared on his forehead.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Mike asked with a frown.

“It means scram.” James answered coldly, him and Winn both having raised their heads back up and were staring daggers at the unwanted guest.

Mike raised his hands in a placating manner, “Woah boys, I didn’t see you there.” Mike got to his feet with a smirk on his face, pausing to lean against the chair he had just vacated to look over the three of them, “I must admit I’m surprised CatCo managed to wrangle three seats on this trip.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Winn bluntly demanded before James and Kara had a chance to stop him already foreseeing the response.

“Just that CatCo hasn’t exactly been a leading news outlet for quite some time. Last I checked, it’s numbers had taken a significant nosedive in recent years.”

Kara took a sharp breath in, her anger ready to bubble up and spew forth but Mike was already walking away and retreating back to the LYNX news delegate at the front of the plane.

“Grrr….” Kara growled, bringing her gaze round to Winn and James who both looked equally as irritated as she did.

“I hate that guy.” James muttered with a sad shake of his head.

“Trip of a lifetime, my ass.” Winn grumbled, slipping overdramatically back down into his seat.

Kara forced out a few deep breaths trying to calm herself down. She turned back to the window hoping to regain the enthusiasm she had had only a moment ago, “It’s going to be incredible… I just know it.” Kara murmured to herself, her eyes alighting on National City, the capital of Theonia, that was coming into view below. Kara’s heart began to thrum and skip as the plane started its descent, knowing to the very core of her soul that this trip would be truly life-changing, she just didn’t know how yet.