Many thanks to BeaconHill and GlassGirlCeci for betareading.

Interlude 12b: Sophia

The brisk scent of the sea air filled Sophia's lungs as she stared out over the water. This part of the city, about half a mile from the noise and business of the Boardwalk, was almost quiet, and the faint caress of gentle waves upon the shore was audible under the eternal bustling, shouting, laughing, crying breath of the living city. She had enjoyed her patrols through this neighborhood, back when she was fighting Annatar, but the fresh E88 tags soured it a little. She almost thought she could smell Emma, an oily stain on the warm July air.

The breeze was otherwise an embrace, soft and intimate on the bare skin of her arms and face. She drank deeply of it, reveling in the freedom of breath free of her mask, of movement unimpeded by her heavy costume. In this moment of solitude, she could almost forget her problems, could live in the sensation of the cool stone railing under her bare palms, and in the warm sea air in her nose.

It wasn't a perfect balm. These moments of quiet, rare as they were, had once been something Sophia actively avoided. They had a bad habit of giving her time to think. Violence and conflict had once been a meditation for her, a way to force her brain to live in the moment and hide from both past and future. It had taken a long time, and a lot of help from Taylor, before she'd escaped that spiral. She wasn't sure whether the escape had come because she'd realized that trying to escape her own head was useless at best and destructive at worst, or because she'd started to have things to think about which didn't make her want to curl up and scream into her knees.

Or maybe it was simpler. Maybe she'd just started to care about another person enough to want to be able to talk to them, be with them, without the trappings of battle hanging over their heads.

It had never been that way with Emma, she mused, her eyes lighting on yet another swastika in ugly red spray paint. The girl might not have been a combatant, but she'd been a fighter. Interacting with her had always been an escape in the same way combat was. Even when Emma had talked about totally inane things, whether boys or clothes or makeup or homework, there had always been an underlying edge to it. Gossip was couched in ideas of relative strength, whether physical or social. Fashion was a way to display pride, power, control. Homework was either worth doing, to gain standing in the eyes of a useful adult, or a waste of time.

That had been all Sophia wanted once. Emma had been a perfect civilian partner as far as she was concerned: compliant, enabling, powerful in ways complementary to Sophia herself, and of course easy on the eyes. If Sophia had been willing to give herself even a minute of introspection, it wouldn't have taken her long to realize what she really wanted from Emma.

But that wasn't how it had gone. Sophia sighed, trying to put Emma out of her mind.

"I'm just… not sure. It feels like we're spinning our wheels. I didn't sign up just to play in the slums."

Oh fuck. Speak of the devil. Sophia's head turned slowly as she glanced back over her shoulder.

The two girls in their black-and-red robes were walking down the street towards her. Oracle's stylized eye seemed to be staring Sophia down, even though the cape seemed to be focused on her teammate.

And there was the rage again. No matter how sorry she could feel for Emma when she wasn't there in front of her, once they were face to face again… the anger always came back. The image of Emma in those fucking robes, shouting alongside the scum who had made her family's life harder for years for no reason beyond their skin…

Sophia clamped down hard on the fury before it could boil. There were at least two Empire capes here, and she was out of costume. She had to get away. She couldn't fight, not here, not now. There's a time and a place, Sophia. Time and place.

Slowly, trying to keep her movements casual, she began to walk away. She carefully didn't look over at the two villains. They hadn't noticed her yet—maybe they weren't in the mood to find a victim right now—

"Hey!" Rune's voice, sharp and harsh, split the night.

Fuck. Sophia's fists clenched. For an instant, she hesitated between one step and the next. Fight or flight?

She didn't have her crossbows. She didn't have a weapon at all, beyond a canister of pepper spray. Rune could throw boulders across the street, and if Oracle had any combat-thinker potential at all, she'd be able to run circles around Sophia unless she used her powers, too. And she was out of costume—doing that would put her family in danger. Even the Empire respected the unwritten rules… until their victims broke them first.

She couldn't fight. Not here, not where she might be seen, and especially not where there might be more Empire capes on the way. Her aborted step became a lunge and she began to sprint.

"Oh, no you don't—" Rune called after her, but Oracle interrupted.

"That's Shadow Stalker!" she exclaimed.

Rune looked back to Oracle. "Should we—"

"Get her!"

The rage flared. It wasn't enough to turn Taylor in, she thought furiously. Now you're making me a target for Nazis? You despicable, unrepentant bitch!

Well, the jig was up now. Sophia ducked into the shadows and melted into the dark. She emerged again halfway down an alleyway, just in time to hear Emma's voice again. "In here! She's trying to run!"

Sophia turned, the glimmer of a streetlamp flickering in her eyes as she saw the two silhouettes follow her into the alleyway. Don't do this, she told herself. You're unarmed. You don't have your tranquilizers. It's too risky. You could get hurt—or you could hurt them.

The eye of Oracle's mask caught the light, red iris and black sclera looking ghastly in the gloom. Her fists clenched. The rage, the animal fury, so tenuously kept at bay by the need to be better, the desire to be more, broke through at last.

She palmed her phone, turning away from the entrance to the alley so the capes wouldn't see the light of the screen. She pulled up her contacts and, with a couple taps, sent a distress call out to Taylor. If nothing else, she told herself, I don't want to hide this from her. Whatever happens.

Then she turned back, slipping her phone in her pocket. "Hey," she called. "I changed my mind."

The two Empire capes stopped short. Sophia could easily imagine their eyes narrowing under their masks, trying to pick her out of the dark. "What do you mean?" called Oracle.

"I'm not trying to run."

There was a pause. Then Rune hissed and stepped forward. "No, you're hiding like a coward!" she sneered. "Darkies in the dark." She spat, but it landed nowhere near the hidden Ward.

Sophia forced a laugh. It came out cold and mirthless. She could have run, sure. They didn't have any way to stop her here, in the shadows. But every word and every sneer made her itch to stand her ground. "Why don't you come here then?" she said. "Walk into my parlor?"

"Said the spider to the fly," Oracle said. Was there a faint mournful edge to her voice, or had Sophia imagined it? "And you really think you're the spider? Two against one, darkie."

"Maybe," said Sophia, and found herself smiling. The anger was simmering, now, almost serene. She knew what she was going to do. "But look at where you are."

"What?"

"Seems like you've forgotten what it means to be afraid of the dark," Sophia said, her smile twisting into a smirk. "I'll have to remind you."

The shadows rose up to cloak her, and she surged through them.

Her fist drove into Rune's cheek before the Nazi could do more than blink. Her elbow buried itself in Oracle's belly.

Rune fell back, swearing, and Oracle let out a sharp gasp, but her hand came up, holding a small object. A gun?

Sophia faded into shadow. Oracle pulled the trigger. Sophia saw the sparking darts emerge from the weapon—taser, not a gun—and only had a moment to regret her decision before her world was pain.

She staggered, her power flickering smokily around her, as Oracle quickly reloaded the taser. "Fuck," Sophia grunted, falling against the wall and holding herself up with a shaking arm. I told her my weakness. "You'd really—"

"Of course," growled Oracle in a voice that was both familiar and foreign, bringing the weapon to bear again.

Sophia ducked, but Oracle didn't fire. Instead, she swung her leg around, faster than Sophia would have believed a few months ago. It caught the Ward as she went down, a knee crashing into her brow, filling her vision with spinning stars.

Sophia stumbled away, spitting, and Oracle followed her, passing her, and then put her leg into Sophia's path. She fell, but phased into shadow and darted back, righting herself as she did so. She changed back into her human form just in time to duck out of the way of Oracle's taser—right into the taser's path. Oracle had known what she would do, almost before she did herself. Sophia just had time to think Combat thinker before her world was pain.

Fire filled her limbs. A low, keening cry emerged unbidden from her mouth. She felt her arms and legs tensing involuntarily. She couldn't move, she couldn't get away, she was trapped…

Cenya flared, bright and green, and she felt something like warm hands pulling her forward. She fell into the dark, allowing the shadows to move around her. They were soft on her skin, like a gentle embrace.

The pain faded, and she was stumbling out of the shadows, tumbling forward on all fours before falling on her side, gasping for breath. Through unfocused eyes, she saw Oracle striding forward, reloading her taser again. Rune was just behind her. Their robes seemed to blend together in a blur of red and black, creating a ghastly, multi-headed creature, stalking towards her.

"How's it feel?" Oracle spat. She was looming over Sophia in full Empire regalia, a taser ready to fire. And Sophia was in civilian clothes, to all the world just another black girl, lying prone on the ground. She looked powerful. Dominant. This was how she wanted Sophia to see her. "Who's the predator now, nigger?"

Sophia blinked rapidly, trying to clear her vision. "I… I don't…"

Oracle raised the taser. "Now, I want a word. You just lie there and don't move, unless you want another few thousand volts."

Can I get away? Sophia blinked again, trying to clear her head. The alley, which had seemed so welcoming a few moments ago, now seemed alien and unfriendly. The shadows were all too close to Oracle, and if she tried to teleport, Oracle would know, would have her taser aimed before she even emerged.

"Don't try it," Oracle warned, kicking Sophia's side. "You just lie there and listen."

Sophia coughed, curling up in pain. "...Fine. Talk."

"Two weeks ago, you were fighting Annatar," Oracle growled. "Now you've gone right back and spread your legs for her. Why?"

When Sophia didn't immediately answer, Oracle kicked her again. Her boots were hard; the toes were probably tipped with steel. Sophia coughed. "What do you want me to say? I wasn't trying to fight her, I was trying to save her. And I did."

Oracle snorted. "Riiiight. You 'saved' her. Saved her from… what? The hassle of world domination? The hard work of crushing her enemies? Or from fucking a bot instead of you?"

Sophia bared her teeth up at Oracle. "It was never about that. She was hurting."

"Yeah. Hurting you." Oracle laughed coldly. "You're so adorable. You think it's real? You think she cares about you?"

"She does care!"

Oracle kicked her again. Sophia felt something give in her chest with an audible snap, making her gasp in pain. "Bullshit," she said. "You can't lie to me, Stalker."

Sophia coughed, and tasted blood on her tongue. "I don't know about T—Annatar," she said, swallowing. "I don't know what she feels. But I know she cares. Maybe not how I do, but that's not the point. It's not about that."

"Like hell it's not about that," spat Oracle. "Like imagining her having her way with you doesn't leave you gasping every damn night. Like you wouldn't bend over in a heartbeat if she asked..."

I need you beside me—now, more than ever.

Then something odd happened. Oracle trailed off, her taser still pointed down at Sophia. "You…" Oracle's voice was suddenly hesitant. "You turned her down?"

That's all I am to you now—a tool you can lead around by her emotions.

"It wasn't about that," Sophia grunted. "It was… the right thing to do."

Rune snorted, but Oracle was silent, staring down at Sophia. Then she made a derisive sound. "Tch. Didn't stop you running back to her now." She gave Sophia one last kick, but it was a little softer this time, as though she was bored. She turned to Rune, walking a few steps away. "What do we do with her?" she asked.

Sophia wasn't listening. As Oracle's robes receded from her vision, she saw what she needed. Past the two Nazis, she could just see the shadow of the low wall at the edge of the pier. From there, she'd be able to teleport anywhere up the street.

She swallowed, trying to gather her strength.

Rune was saying something. "...Think she called for help?"

"Don't know," said Oracle. "Don't really want to find out. If we're taking her, we'd better—"

Sophia entered the shadows. There was a vertigo-inducing moment of transition, and then she was leaning against the low stone wall, staring back into the alleyway.

For a moment, Oracle's mask seemed to stare straight at her. Rune gasped. "Where'd she go!?"

Sophia struggled to pull herself to her feet. Oracle said nothing for a second, then seemed to shake herself. "Over there!"

Rune turned, but Sophia had gotten to her feet. There was nothing she wanted to do more than punch these two Nazis' lights out… but the ache in her chest and the taste of blood on her tongue put that notion to bed. Without a word, she faded into the dark and out of their sight.