Kara turned to see a woman. Much to her surprise a very normal, everyday sort of woman.

"Are you Death?" Kara asked hesitantly. The question felt rude somehow.

Kara knew that death personified itself throughout the multiverse, though that personification varied from reality to reality, world to world, culture to culture, sometimes even from one person's experience to another. And she remembered overheard conversations about such things when she visited the Justice League's headquarters. Comments by Dr. Fate, and quiet dialog between the magic wielders who dealt with things she and Kal weren't well suited for. Strange stories too, but not like the ones she and her friends had told each other as children at night before they would dive giggling into their beds. Some of it was very disturbing, it was one of the reasons she had never spent much time at the JLA headquarters. She had never quite gotten the skill of tuning things out like Kal, probably because she hadn't grown up with her powers like he had.

But this woman in front of her wasn't in the least intimidating. In fact she reminded her a little of the pictures she had seen of Clark's adopted mother, Martha Kent. And a little of the women who had worked at the orphanage where she stayed when she first came to Earth. A small, nondescript woman with a kindly face and smile, pleasant and comfortable. Peaceful. After the epic things she had seen and experienced in her life, and then death, this seemed somehow anticlimactic.

"No, not death." Her voice was sweet, inviting, comfortable. Kara wondered if that was by design. "I'm hardly that important. I'm just a friend here, someone to talk to. To help you learn the things you need to know. I know you're just filled with questions." The woman had spread a blanket on the grass. Was that a tea service and tray? Here? "Please come sit with me awhile dear. Do you use sugar? I used to, but it always makes it hard for me to sleep at night."

"Um... no sugar, thank you." Kara decided she liked the woman, she wasn't sure why. Kara sat down again, crossing her legs and feeling the rough texture of the blanket. Rough texture, and she could feel it. She could feel textures, smell the flowers in the air, feel the warmth of the day. "I shouldn't be surprised," she thought, "but I am. I don't know why." She looked again at the woman as she went about preparing the tea, uncovering a small plate with little pastries, opening a tiny container of what looked like marmalade. "Do you sleep?" Kara asked. "If we're dead, why sleep?"

Another smile. "Sleep is something you can value, even when you can only walk between. It brings a different viewpoint to the world. A sense of perspective. It's one of the many things created with Life that has value to more than the living, even outside of Life." She glanced sideways at Kara. "You don't have to give up everything when you're here. You don't even have to stay here."

"Stay here?" Surprise after surprise, it seemed. "I have a choice?"

The woman giggled a little and offered the cup of tea to Kara. Her hand shook slightly, the cup faintly rattling against the saucer. "Of course! Kara, there is always choice. Always!" Kara took the cup and sipped the tea, realizing it was a bit too hot. Yet another surprise, she realized suddenly that she was sensitive to temperature. The Kryptonian powers she had in life must not have followed her here. Kara gazed into her cup, at the small tea leaves that moved at the bottom with the motions of her hand. In life she had the ability to see things that few other could see, but she realized that now she was perceiving things in a different way. Not with more detail, not more clarity, but different in a way she couldn't quite describe yet. Almost as if everything she sensed was a part of her.

"They are a part of you. And of me." Apparently this woman read minds, Kara thought.

"No, I don't read minds," she quickly responded, "not in that way. Kara, you're no longer alive, and this world is what it is because it's what you perceive it to be. You are what you are right now in this place because it's what you're familiar with. I seem familiar to you because familiarity is what you want right now. These are your choices, I'm merely along for the ride as you would have said in life."

The woman continued. "Your choices now are infinite, limited only by your desire and will. Some you will create, and some will be brought to you." She paused, closed her eyes, and Kara felt a change in her demeanor. "And here is the beginning of those choices. Kara, there are those who would like to meet with you. One you know." Another pause, and a deep breath. Kara was amused, despite herself. Why does she breathe? Why do either of us breathe? The woman started again. "The first is someone who has a story to tell, and indicated he wants to apologize." She stopped and stared into the distance as if remembering something long ago. "Now isn't that a surprise? He has never apologized to anyone, in any of his incarnations. Even to me, though he owes me one too. But that's a story for another time. You knew him as the Spectre."

Kara was shocked, and a bit frightened. "The Spectre wants to meet with me?" She remembered the times she had met the Spectre. He made her feel strange, as if he knew things about her she didn't know herself, now she realized that he probably did. He always looked at everyone strangely if he looked at them at all, like he was looking through them or past them at something far away. But at times he looked directly at her, and his gaze lingered. Not like the gaze of a man. Like all women she was familiar with that. Sometimes he seemed a bit sad, the sort of sadness that you didn't want to try to penetrate. But always knowing. Most of the time he seemed to be filled with wrath, as if he was always seeking vengeance for some wrong. Strange, here she was, dead, and thinking about the Spectre still bothered her. Even now he made her feel like a child.

Kara's voice was small, quiet. "I'm not sure I want to meet the Spectre. He makes me nervous."

"That isn't surprising really. The Spectre is a personification of ultimate vengeance. You, my dear, are driven by hope. Vengeance and Hope, true hope, don't often dwell in the same vessel, one tends to drive out the other. But you shouldn't worry, you're beyond his grasp now." The woman tilted her head sideways, a thoughtful look on her face. "That's a very unusual thing for a Hero. Hope, and Life I believe you said."

"When did I say that? We've just met." Kara stopped again. She realized now that she knew this woman, but she didn't know from where. But Kara knew she was right, even now it was hope that was driving her. There had to be hope.

The woman sighed and put her cup down. "Most Heroes are motivated by a desire for gain," she continued, as if Kara hadn't spoken, "or a need for justification. Personal significance, a sense of loss, proving their worth." She held out her hand and counted one finger against another. "Retribution. Guilt. Sorrow. Pain. Duty. So many reasons, many of them worthy, many not. The worthiness of the motivation is always secondary to the behavior it engenders and the ends that it achieves. But Hope, and Life? My dear, you're not unique in the Multiverse, but you're certainly rare. Perhaps unique in your former line of work. It's no wonder you've stirred things up."

Kara was nonplussed. "What do you mean, stirred things up. I haven't done anything since I've been here. Except talk to you."

The woman laughed, and the laugh made Kara smile and then laugh too. It was an infectious laugh, so full of warmth and love. "Oh little girl, you would not believe it. That was really a very heroic death you know. And so full of purpose, and passion, and even love! Iconic, very iconic. You are quite the object of discussion, you provided them with a lot to talk about for a long time." She paused, noticing Kara's quizzical look. "Yes, of course, I'm sorry. I'm getting ahead of myself, please forgive an old lady her lack of focus. Let me try this differently." She crossed her hands in her lap, lifted her chin, and said in an odd formal way, "Kara, may I reintroduce you to an old acquaintance?"

Kara felt a presence, and realized that there was someone else standing nearby. Green cloak, hood partially obscuring the face, a white costume that she still wasn't sure wasn't actually skin. Well, she had been told that the choices were hers, she might as well go along with it.

"Is it Spectre, or would you prefer Mr. Spectre? Please, sit down for awhile." Kara said calmly. "Would you like some tea?" The old woman smiled, and prepared another cup.