Supergirl Recap With Spoilers: Ace Reporter

The episode opens as Supergirl flies through the city, arriving at the DEO enthusiastic about her workday. However, there's nothing going on that requires her help, and everyone else at the DEO is going off to do the more mundane parts of her job.

At home, Kara has ruined what is apparently her fifth attempt at a pineapple upside down cake, when Lena comes to her door. She tells Lena that she's upset about being unemployed, and Lena tells Kara that there's a press conference today, and that the CEO of the company making the announcement is her ex-boyfriend. He's invited her, but she wants Kara to come along as her date.

At the press conference, Kara ends up sitting near Snapper, who's not happy to see her there, and reiterates his frustration with her previous lack of journalistic ethics.

Jack Spheer, Lena's ex-partner and ex-boyfriend arrives on stage to announce his new product — he cuts his hand on camera, and a small army of flying nanobots fly to him, cauterizing the wounds with tiny lasers.

Lena is excited to see that he's finally accomplished what the two were working toward together. Lena's eyes and Jack's meet, right after he drops the revolutionary treatment's name: Biomax.

The crowd is thrilled and impressed, except for Snapper Carr.

At the press conference, he calls on Kara first, largely because she's next to Lena, and she and Snapper briefly spar over it before she gets a good question out and Jack answers it.

After the fact, Jack and Lena meet up and are cute in front of Kara. She leaves to let them be alone, and is approached by one of Spheer's employees, who says he needs to talk to her about Spheer.

Elsewhere, Jack invites Lena to dinner, but before she can answer, he's pulled away to talk to shareholders.

Later, Guardian is battling baddies in an alley when the police come to pick up his haul. Inside the battle wagon, Winn and Lyra are making out. James is mad that she's there, and mad that she knows his secret, so she has to excuse herself so they can argue. Winn argues that rehabilitating Lyra is James's moral responsibility and he reluctantly agrees to work with her.

Nearby, Kara gets into a car, and a man named Joe Watkins, who says he was a lab technician at Spheerical until he was recently fired, tells her that he thinks the human test trials for Biomax were faked.

As he's saying this, the car is surrounded by nanobots, which blow it up; Kara escapes, but Watkins is killed and her tattered, burning clothes reveal her Supergirl costume.

At the CatCo office, she asks James to file a Freedom of Information Act request for her. He's willing, until Snapper comes and picks a fight over it. Kara backs off, but uses her super-hearing to spy on his conversation with James.

At LuthorCorp, Spheer visits Lena and tries to charm her into going to dinner with him. He tells her that he doesn't like how things ended with them, and ultimately convinces her to go to a non-romantic dinner.

Elsewhere, Snapper is meeting with someone who was ostensibly one of the human trial test subjects for Biomax. While they're talking — the kid says he never did any actual tests — the apartment is attacked by nanobots. Supergirl flies in to rescue them, freezing the cloud of nanobots in place with her breath and then helping them make an escape.

At home, Kara unloads on Mon-El about everything that happened. He tells her that Lena is having dinner with Jack, and Kara decides to invite herself and Mon-El along. They arrive at the restaurant, where they join Lena and Jack. She asks him about the human trials, and he tells her that they're a matter of public record and she can check.

When Lena asks how he had a breakthrough, Jack admits that it came only after he realized that he was useless without Lena. He realized that if he could model the nano-swarm after bees, where they would imitate a single queen bee, then all it would take to effectively control hem is to control he "queen."

Lena is impressed, but Jack admits he never would have got there if he hadn't been thinking about Lena. Despite Kara and Mon-El's attempts to butt in, Lena asks that they have some time alone. The pair leave, but not before Mon-El creepily hugs Jack…only to reveal to Kara afterwards that he had stolen Jack's security badge.

At L-Corp, Jack apologizes to Lena for making her choose between him and her company. She tells him that she often wonders what would have happened if she had stayed behind, too. Each of them realized, too late, that making the choice between love or her family was a false one.

At Spheerical, Mon-El and Kara make their way into Jack's office, where they look at his files for the Biomax human trials. The video they find is Jack injecting himself with a nano-swarm. He almost immediately turns into a swarm himself, and Kara realizes that there was no human trial — that he knew Biomax was dangerous from the beginning.

Kara finally realizes that Jack is the killer, since there were no human trials. She has Mon-El insert a thumb drive to steal some data, and as soon as he does, Jack stops making out with Lena and tells her he has to go — that he forgot something at the office.

A cloud of nanobots appear outside of the window at Spheerical, then re-form in the shape of Jack; after Kara and Mon-El have run off, Jack looks around suspiciously.

At LuthorCorp, Kara goes to tell Lena that Biomax is dangerous and that Jack is covering it up. Lena instantly becomes cold and denies it, but Kara shows her the video of Jack injecting himself with the nanos-swarm. Lena asks Kara to let her talk to him before she publishes the story, but Kara tells her to stay away for her own safety. Reluctantly, Lena makes the promise, and then asks Kara to see herself out. Kara apologizes, but Lena tells her that she was just doing her job.

At the alien dive bar, Winn tries to butter up Lyra with drinks and dessert before telling her that she went overboard with the kid at the liquor store, and that he and James won't work with her anymore.

She blows up at him, blaming James and then ultimately telling Winn that she's going to the bathroom and to leave before she gets back. He leaves, storming past James on the way out.

At CatCo, Kara brings Snapper some documents — her research on Speerical — and he's reluctant to accept her help, but after she expresses her regret about the way things went down with the Cadmus blog, he says "finally," and the two jump into action. Snapper tells Kara that he believes Breen might be as responsible as Jack is for what happened, and Kara excuses herself.

Lena confronts Jack about the Biomax thing, saying that they had always known there were side effects — the rats they had injected with the nanobots became completely subservient. By the time she realizes he's telling the truth, it's too late: He goes quiet, and Breen, from behind him, reveals herself to be pulling his strings.

Lena and Breen argue over the various violations the Biomax clan have been up to. Before Breen can force Jack to inject Lena and essentially force her to take over L Corp, Supergirl arrives to rescue her. After a short fight, the nanobots have Supergirl pinned down, but Lena manages to subdue Breen and get instructions from Jack on how to stop the nanobots. Breen tries to stop her, warning that since Jack has merged with them, killing them would kill him, but Jack tells her to do it and she does, freeing Supergirl in the process and sending Jack sprawling to the ground. Lena cries.

Kara comes to visit Lena, bringing flowers, and Lena is in shock and mourning. She remembers how her mother was after Lex got arrested, and she's worried about the person this might make her when she comes out of denial. Kara tells her that she'll be there to make sure that doesn't happen, and that they'll always be friends.

Elsewhere, James tells Winn that he's sorry about how he reacted about Lyra — that he's the best friend James has had since Clark. He surprises Winn by bringing Lyra back to the van, revealing that there are going to be ground rules, but that she's back on the team.

At CatCo, Kara brings Snapper a danish she baked at home. He's grateful, and he shows her the latest magazine; he gave her a co-byline with him on the Spheerical story, telling her she did well. He tells her that he needs more reporters like her, who are pursuing the truth regardless of the risk, so she can have her job back.

At L-Corp, someone comes to see Lena after hours. It's Rhea, who says she has a business proposition for Lena.