3.4

Saturday! The day of no school, the day of possibility! Of adventure! Of going to the Boardwalk! The cinema! The mall!

If she wasn't grounded for a month.

"Mhmm okay how about this" Madison muttered to herself, grabbing a novel from her bookshelf before trying to move the book and only the book to the empty space above her bed.

Like the first five times she'd tried with other things, nothing happened and after another several minutes of no results she'd given it up as another failure. Madison wasn't sure if she was grasping at straws, but she'd figured it was worth seeing if she could extend her teleportation to things she was holding. After all her clothes came with her when she teleported, so she was pretty sure it wasn't a completely stupid idea.

Still, she was about ready to give up on it, or at least shelve the idea for another time. She'd first tried with her notepad, then with a couple of different sized pennies, a pencil, an eraser, a single piece of paper and then a whole book. Her power hadn't responded, but there hadn't been anything to go off either. She didn't feel like she was pushing at her power in a way it didn't like or was just on the edge of figuring something out. The only thing she had noticed was that if she concentrated long enough she had the vague impression that she could store whichever of the items she was holding in her Inventory, but that was just telling her something she already knew.

Quest hadn't appeared since the cafeteria so she'd discounted the possibility of getting any help from her power and that left her stuck with trying random things to see if anything actually worked. The quest reward of 'competence' had started to look a little less snarky the less progress she felt like she'd made.

Without TV or games, the only thing left beyond the homework she was studiously ignoring was her PC and phone. Of the latter she was only getting texts from a few people since the events of Friday and it had been jarring at first to go from having her phone blowing up at all hours of the day, to maybe a couple of messages over the course of a few hours.

Daphne still seemed to want to be friends with her, even if she'd confided that she wouldn't be able to talk to her in public and Roz was just her usual self. Julia had apparently decided to turn hate mail into a hobby and Madison was more than happy to let her keep digging her own grave, not bothering to read anything with the other girl's name attached.

Emma meanwhile had ended up sending her a single long rant that morning which she'd given up on reading halfway through, let alone replying to. Madison had half expected something from Sophia too and she wasn't sure if the lack of anything at all was a good or a bad thing as the day dragged on.

She'd tried to do a little bit of writing, but it was suddenly a lot harder to focus on writing fan fiction about capes when she just ended up thinking about her own powers. Then she ended up wondering what she'd say to Armsmaster or Glory Girl when she met them and then she ended up daydreaming about taking down Lung or Kaiser in some epic team-up when she eventually debuted.

That thought had taken her down a whole other rabbit trail as she then wondered if writing any fanfics that included herself would count as self insert fan fiction, or if it would actually be weirder to obviously exclude herself. After that she couldn't stop thinking about some of the other fanfics she'd read and wondered if some of the stories she'd found about certain capes might have been written by the capes themselves. It had been a weird train of thought.

PHO at least always had something going on and she'd easily wasted a couple of hours browsing through a few of the boards. A multi-page, winding thread about Hookwolf being spotted in the Docks had turned into a list of banned and infracted posts longer than her arm and she hadn't been able to help herself reading a lot of the: 'I used to be an independent and then I joined the Wards' posts, which were always floating about in conspicuously easy to find places.

They didn't do anything to actually change her mind, but it did make her feel better that if she was ever press ganged into it, it wasn't going to be the absolute end of her life as she knew it that the Wards sometimes looked like from the outside. Especially given her sudden new perspective on the organisation.

Saturday became Sunday and then before she knew it Monday had reared its head again and all of her trepidation came with it. Despite her best efforts she still hadn't finished her infuriatingly vague quest and she knew she was missing something and even worse was knowing that it probably meant she'd need to get out of the house to experiment further. That was a whole can of worms she'd decided to kick down the road to tackle next weekend unless she got a lucky break in the mean time.

There was nothing really different about Homeroom when she arrived at Winslow beyond Julia going out of her way to give her the cold shoulder, which suited Madison just fine. She wasn't the one Madison was actively on the lookout for, even if she wasn't going to let her guard down around the other girl either.

Math was similarly uneventful, namely because she'd actually forced herself to get her homework done and had a normal class the same as everyone else.

When they were told to split into groups in World Issues, it quickly became apparent what had changed since lunchtime on the Friday previous.

"Get lost Madison, we don't want you in our group, maybe if you get on your hands and knees and begged first?" Julia laughed and Madison had looked to the other two at their usual table. Daphne had just looked guilty and hadn't been able to meet her eyes whilst Roz had just shrugged, every appearance of nonchalance even though she had so blatantly picked a side. Weirdly Madison found herself pissed off at Roz most of all, sure she'd been upfront about it when she'd messaged, but at least Julia despite being a massive bitch committed to the bit in public too.

But she didn't say anything, not that there would have been any point, turning back to Julia with a shrug. "Alright, see ya" she waved, walking over to Taylor's group and pausing when the three of them looked up.

"Hey" she offered weakly, meeting Taylor's eyes as they flitted from her to the girls behind her and back again, feeling more than a little nervous all of a sudden. "I kind of got kicked out."

Taylor gave her a flat look that seemed to drag on for far too long before she rolled her eyes and motioned for Madison to sit. "Come on, tell me you've at least read the chapter Gladly assigned on Friday?"

"Yeah" she replied a little hurriedly in relief as she took the open seat next to Taylor and put her things down on the table. "And thanks Taylor" she added as the taller girl couldn't seem to decide between her ingrained desire to ignore Madison, or consider her the lesser of two evils as Greg tried to draw them both into a conversation.

'Maybe things won't be so bad after all.' Madison thought to herself as Taylor made a decision and turned back to her.

.

.

Sophia Hess

Something had changed and she didn't like it.

Things had been going fine, or at least as fine as they could be in a shithole like Winslow. Emma was getting stronger and even Madison had been starting to look like she might actually amount to something if they kept getting her involved in things.

The plan with the flute had seemed like a great idea at the time. Emma had gotten lucky and seen Hebert putting it away when she thought no one was looking and when Emma had explained just how much it meant to the weakling it had been worth using her breaker state to get into the locker and grab it.

Emma kept thinking that maybe with another push Hebert would actually grow a pair, but Sophia knew better. There were only two types of people anywhere. When she was a vigilante it was her and anyone who got in her way and even now when she was stuck in the Wards, she was still the top dog even if she had to play nice with the children.

Winslow might have been a shithole, but it wasn't any different; Empire fucks, ABB, Merchants and probably a dozen other minor gangs trying to act tough and size each other up, all of them thinking they were the biggest thing around. Then there were the unaffiliated, the ones who were strong enough to stand up for themselves, herself and Emma thanks to her.

Everyone else? They were the sheep, just the prey for all the other bigger fish swinging their dicks around like they owned the place. Some of them got recruited by the gangs and then just because they were wearing colours or beat up a minority they thought they weren't the same limp dick fucks they always had been. Some of them got killed because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time, because they were stupid or because they didn't have what it took to actually fight back.

That was Hebert and thank fuck she'd shown Emma how much of a waste of time Hebert was for her. She hadn't fucking rescued Emma just so that pathetic bitch could drag her down again. No, Hebert had her place and just needed to be reminded of it sometimes and if it helped Emma get even stronger? Win-win in her book.

The flute thing had just been proof of that at first. Hebert had cried like a bitch just like Emma said she would and it was fucking pathetic. Hebert didn't even try and fight her for it. If someone took something of her mom's she'd kick their fucking teeth in. But no, Hebert begged Emma for it like the waste of space she was.

It had been good, better than she'd been expecting and she'd thought maybe Hebert would finally get the message that no one wanted her around and Emma at least had finally seemed to realise Hebert wasn't ever going to be on their level.

Of course Hebert hadn't come to school the next day, she didn't know why Emma had acted so surprised about it. Hebert had probably still been crying in her room like all the other times she hadn't come back to school after they'd got one over on her, so that was nothing new. But then Emma had called her because some-fucking-body had broken into her locker at some point and stolen the stupid thing and her gym bag too!

Emma thought it was Hebert obviously and Sophia couldn't really blame her for it. Emma hadn't worked a crime scene, tracked down gangers and fucked them up like they deserved. It was obvious what had happened, Emma had been flaunting the flute for everyone to see, so it wouldn't have taken much for one of the stoned idiots to think they could fence it for another easy high after school. It wasn't like any of the cameras in Winslow actually worked or she wouldn't have even tried taking Hebert's flute in the first place.

But Emma just wouldn't stop going on about it. Usually Mads was there at least, but she'd called in sick too so she was the one who had to put up with Emma's bitching all day. She'd even checked Hebert's locker, but obviously it wasn't there and it still hadn't shut Emma up so she wasn't sure why she'd bothered. She'd ended up hoping Mads would be back on Friday just so she could put the smaller girl in front of Emma and let her deal with Emma's ranting instead.

Well she'd got her fucking wish hadn't she? Mads had seemed alright when Sophia had seen her in the morning, bit nervous as always, but Emma was like that once too and she'd turned out fine after a bit of encouragement. She'd heard from Emma later that Hebert was back too, but Sophia hadn't expected Hebert to crawl back in so soon and so she'd been left wondering if there would even be anything worth doing to her, when Hebert would just have the weekend to get back on her feet and waste her efforts.

She'd met up with Emma after class and they'd grabbed seats in the Cafeteria as always, Emma had bitched at her that Mads refused to do anything to Hebert in second period which was stupid, but if Mads was still unwell then that was fair enough she supposed. It wasn't like they'd gotten Mads to do all that much to Hebert yet anyway, which was another thing Sophia knew she'd have to focus on once she got Emma to stop tunnel-visioning about the stupid flute.

Then Julia had turned up with that even more annoying bitch Roz and the other one that never said anything. Sophia didn't like Julia but she respected her at least. Julia was always trying to claw her way up the pecking order, had to respect that at the end of the day even if she hated listening to half the bullshit that came out of her mouth she didn't give a fuck about. Why would she care who was fucking who?

Then her whole day had gone to shit when Mads had actually decided to show up and she was still trying to wrap her head around what the fuck had happened.

Emma had tried to call out Julia on her bullshit when Mads had sat down, give her an opening to show some spine, keep building her up a bit. But then Mads just went and admitted to all of it?! Started sticking up for Hebert! Saying she was suddenly better than all of them, that they, she should apologise?!

So she had called Madison out on it just to get her to shut up, have a word with her later and sort out whatever the fuck had happened, but Mads just didn't fucking back down.

Sophia was about ready to take another few inches off the little bitch's height and Mads had called her fucking bluff right there in front of everyone. That wasn't the Mads Emma had introduced her too, the timid little mouse that had finally started growing a pair. Yeah that what she wanted Mads to be like eventually, but not to her.

She didn't know what the fuck had happened. She'd been thinking about it all through Computer Studies, but nothing about any of it made sense. Mads had been off sick for a couple of days and then it was like by lunch she'd just become a totally different person.

She'd still being stewing in it when she'd seen Hebert going to Art ahead of her, idiot had thought she was already in the room, didn't even see her coming and it made her feel right when the lanky loser had tripped into the door and everyone had a good laugh.

But then she'd realised some of those fuckers weren't just laughing at Hebert, they'd seen or heard what had happened at lunch. They weren't just laughing at Hebert face planting into a door, they thought she was weak for showing Hebert her place, they were laughing at her.

The more time she'd had to think about it the more confused and angry she'd got, especially after having even more time with nothing better to do after Piggy had dumped her on console duty on Sunday, right after the little green princess had bitched her out for going off the kiddie routes on patrol. Just her luck with how her week had gone.

Nothing was making sense when Monday finally rolled around, Emma was still pissed about the whole thing which was fair enough, but Mads hadn't even approached them. She hadn't replied to the message Emma said she'd sent, hadn't apologised to any of them at all.

The worst part wasn't that Mads didn't seem to care, it was that other people saw that she didn't. Sophia saw the lack of respect she was getting, just because the midget had decided to backtalk her and she hadn't slapped her right back down. Yeah she was a Ward and one of the meanest bitches around but she wasn't a fucking idiot, she was a black girl in Winslow and the skinheads were just waiting for any excuse to try and jump her with weight of numbers on their side. Hell the only reason they hadn't started shit already was because they didn't care who was 'bullying' a dyke and she wasn't stupid enough to let them get her alone.

Sophia had thought maybe things would settle down as the week went on and it did sort of. Everyone forgot about the whole Friday lunch thing, or at least stopped caring, but now Mads was just her own group, acting like she could walk around by herself and not give a shit. She was acting nice with Hebert, hell she'd even seen them have a whole fucking conversation and that was the worst part. Hebert was starting to think she was something again, Emma didn't seem to notice it but she sure as hell did.

Hebert was getting a bit more confident, wasn't reacting as much to the shit they said to her, she'd even seen the lanky bitch smiling. It was disgusting and she hated that at the way things were heading she was going to have to point it out to Emma and Julia too.

When Mads hadn't even made eye contact by the middle of the week she'd had enough. She'd been patient, she'd waited for Mads to actually apologise, but she kept walking around like only Hebert existed! She'd seen her greeting Hebert in the mornings and Hebert had even started replying! It was infuriating just watching her work come undone even if no one else, not even fucking Hebert herself could see it yet.

Julia's incessant bitching about putting Mads in her place had been grating. Like most of what the other girl spewed really, but Julia hadn't been wrong, even if she hadn't wanted to give other girl the satisfaction of agreeing with her.

So she figured she'd knock away some of that confidence, remind Mads just how small she was. Maybe she'd even realise what she was missing out on, even if Sophia was doubtful Mads could really be salvaged by that point. She didn't share any classes with the other girl which was a pain, but they'd been friends long enough that it was easy to remember the routes she took.

She'd started small, just a shove, tripping her, to remind Mads she wasn't safe just because she could say shit and walk away, but it hadn't fucking worked.

Sophia didn't understand it. She'd put her foot out and the other girl would just step over it, she'd shoulder check her and it was like the small girl just glided out of the way. She didn't even seem to fucking realise she was doing it! She'd had one of the other girls do it so she could watch and Mads didn't even seem to notice someone was trying to trip her up!

She knew she wasn't, hadn't ever been close with Mads, but she sure as fuck would have remembered if the girl had mentioned she'd been doing parkour or something to give her reflexes like that!

And as much as part of her just wanted to lay the girl out, teach her why she'd earned the respect she got in the halls - Well she knew there were limits to what even she could get away with. Hebert's reputation was lower than trash, but Mads was still on their level in the teacher's eyes at least. Give her a black eye or some cause to go cry to Blackwell and they'd actually believe the little upstart and try and rake her over the coals for it. Her handler probably wouldn't fold, the woman was spineless, but she knew she'd be in deep shit if anything got back to the PRT. The school could still make her life hell though, might even get back to the PRT anyway if they thought they needed to get her mom involved.

Worst was she couldn't just take it out on Hebert since she was spending more time with Mads and Mads would always get in the way if someone looked like they were going to start something. Worse that none of the sheep wanted to try anything while the two of them were together either.

She'd underestimated Mads twice. It was irritating and humiliating, even if she was the only one who actually knew all of the details. But she was Shadow Stalker.

She'd nailed more skinheads to walls than all of the other Wards put together. She was the only goddamn vigilante on the East Coast that had kept her costume and her name when she went legit.

So she'd figure out just what the fuck was going on and deal with it the same she did any other problem that got in her way.

Because Sophia Hess didn't lose, she made everyone else lose.