The Wonderful Adventures of Sophia Hess, Babysitter Extraordinaire

[YseultNott]

In the present (2009)




A tray slams on the table before Sophia with all the grace of a landslide, and she raises her head from her lunch.

"My name is Brianna Dorsey," says the girl now sitting in front of her. "Call me Dee."

'Dee' is small and looks incredibly delicate, with the kind of beauty that comes from hours spent in front of a mirror and not having money as an object. Fashionable clothes, perfectly styled pixie cut, impeccably manicured hands. No makeup, though, probably vetoed by the parents.

She's smiling widely. Her teeth are very, very white.

"Go away," says Sophia.

Dee's smile doesn't falter.

"No."

"Go. Away."

"No."

Shit, that smile is pissing her off.

"Go away, Brianna."

Somehow, Dee's smile becomes even larger.

"Oh, I like you," she says, and Sophia really wants to punch her into her ridiculously perfect teeth.

She doesn't. They're in the middle of the cafeteria, and Sophia isn't stupid.

"What do you want?" she grinds out instead.

"I want to be friends," Dee says brightly.

 

[YseultNott]

In the Past (2007)




The following day, Sophia waits for Eddie to take a nap, and raids the pantry of the neighboring house.

(Not the one that looks like her house. She doesn't… She doesn't want to go there ever again.)

It's slow. The Shadow form means it's, not safe, but safer, means she can go through walls, and the Things as they try to catch her.

(She still tries to avoid the Things if she can.)

(They're… Wrong.)

The Shadow form makes it almost safe, but there is only so much she can take with her in it.

And then, Sophia makes a mistake.

She's crouching in the kitchen of the house she's raiding, trying to see if she can find other cans of food behind boxes of rice, when there's a noise behind her, like a footstep, and she goes to Shadow form on instinct.

It's a Thing.

There's a Thing in the house. Sophia hadn't checked the other rooms.

It almost got her.

She gets back to where Eddie is sleeping and starts shaking.

It almost got her.

She thinks about the Thing with her face in the bedroom of the house that isn't hers.

 

[YseultNott]

In the present (2009)




Sophia wakes up.

She stays very, very still for a few seconds, and then scrambles to turn on the night lamp.

Electricity is running.

The sheets on her bed are ones she got after coming back.

The stick figure she had Eddie spray-paint on the wall is there.

She's home. She's fine. She's home.

She's home.

She lets herself fall back on the mattress.

Shit.

Shit.

She'd thought…

She had started to get less nightmares, hadn't had one that bad in a while, and it's not the first time they've slowed down before coming back in force, but she'd hoped…

The nightmare was bad.

(She was the Thing with her face in the house that wasn't hers. She was the Thing with her face, and another face was Steven's and he wouldn't stop talking and she could never get away.)

 

[YseultNott]

In the past (2007)




Eddie wants a story.

Sophia hasn't left the house in two days, too shaken by the close call with the Thing, and she's starting to go stirr-crazy. She wants to run, to shout, to hit something, not to tell stories.

Eddie is missing his Mom. He doesn't understand what's going on, and he's getting whinier and whinier, and she's scared he's going to throw a tantrum, and scream, and the Things will come for them.

(He's five. She doesn't know how to make him understand he needs to be quiet all the time.)

(It's not like she can run, or shout, or hit things.)

She pours bottled water in a cup, and add instant chocolate. She doesn't have any way to heat it up, except maybe starting a fire, and she doesn't want to take the risk, so it stays cold. Then, she gives it to Eddie, and sits on the sofa with him, and tries to come up with a story to tell.

She makes up a version of Red Riding Hood where the little girl fights back and kills the wolf herself.

 

[YseultNott]

In the present (2009)




"A prisoner has to choose between three rooms," Dee says.

She's been hanging out around Sophia for three days, now, either ignoring or laughing at her harshness and attempts to make her go away, and Sophia finds herself toning the aggressivity down a bit. Dee smiles a lot, in a way that makes Sophia very aware that smiles are just another way to bare teeth.

Sophia wouldn't call her a friend, but she's, well.

She's not too bad to have around.

"The first room is filled with fire," Dee continues. "The second room is is a pit full of spikes, and there's a lion who hasn't eaten for a year in the third. Which room should the prisoner choose if he wants to live?"

"The lion," Sophia says. "He can't do anything against the fire or the spikes, but he can try to fight the lion, and maybe kill it."

Dee stays silent for a few seconds.

"It was supposed to be because the lion would be dead after being starved for a year, but it is the lion, and you do have a point, so you win this one. Your turn!"

Rory gives Sophia a thumbs up from two tables away.

 

[YseultNott]

In the past (2007)




In the end, Sophia's need to move gets stronger than her fear, and she goes out again.

(This time, she checks the whole house first, and makes sure the door of the rooms she searches is closed.)

She finds a radio, the kind that's used to listen the news.

The kind that works on batteries.

She immediately goes back 'home'.

The radio doesn't turn on.

Sophia resolutely doesn't cry.

She looks through some drawers, and finds some batteries. She exchanges them with the ones inside the radio.

The radio turns on.

No matter which station she tries, all Sophia can get is static.

 

[YseultNott]

In the present (2009)



A man without safety equipment is washing windows on the 30th floor. He falls, but isn't hurt or killed. Why?

Sophia stares at the text for a few seconds, then presses send. Dee only takes about a minute to text back.

He's inside the building

Sophia snorts.

That was fast, she sends.

I already knew that one

Not the first time it happened, on either side. There are only so many riddles in the world.

A chimes signals the arrival of another text.

My mom's calling for dinner. See you tomorrow!

See you tomorrow texts back Sophia.

She thinks she will bring a second muffin, and share.

 

[YseultNott]

In the Past (2007)



In the end, food is their downfall.

Because, well.

Eddie is five.

It's August, and it's hot, and no electricity means no AC, and Eddie wants ice-cream.

Sophia doesn't have any ice-cream.

Eddie throws a tantrum, and screams, and Sophia clamps a hand over his mouth, but it's already too late.

The Things have heard.

There are sounds outside, Things banging against the shutters and the door, and Sophia tries to use the furnitures as barricades, but they are heavy, hard to move, and she is out of time.

The door breaks down, and the Things come in.

Sophia isn't sure what happens next, her actions blurred together by the beating of her heart in her ears, but she manages to get Eddie and herself out.

There are Things outside.

 

[YseultNott]

In the Present (2009)




Drinking a cup of hot chocolate with Miss Bass before going home becomes something of a ritual.

Sophia still doesn't talk. She doesn't know how.

Sophia doesn't talk, but she knows Miss Bass would listen if she did, would listen and would care, and that alone is not quite enough, but it almost is and that's a start.

Eddie sits in her lap, heavy and warm, and shows her a drawing he made, and Miss Bass asks her about her day, and in her pocket there's a riddle sent by Dee, and earlier that day Dean tried to describe what his powers were like and sounded like he'd gotten high, and Sophia is still sharp, Sophia still isn't nice, Sophia still isn't kind, but all those things are sweet against her bitterness, like sugar and milk in cacao powder.

Sophia has a not-quite-home, and it's not-quite-enough, but it's so much better than not having a home at all.

 

[YseultNott]

Sophia dodges the Things as well as she can, but it's hard, because she has to carry Eddie and she can't take him with her in Shadow form, and she can't do stuff like punching or kicking them because she doesn't know if they can absorb her if she touches them through clothes.

(There's a Thing with her face in the house that isn't hers, and Sophia doesn't want to end like that.)

Sophia dodges as well as she can, but she knows she can't hold on forever.

She's getting tired. Her arms hurt from Eddie's weight, and she's out of breath, and everything is blurry, and she's getting dizzy and…

She trips.

She trips, and falls, and a Thing bends down and raises a hand toward her.

A halberd cuts down the Thing's arm, and the blue of Armsmaster's armor is the most beautiful thing Sophia has ever seen.

"Take them to the portal !" he says, and Velocity is there, too, and he takes Eddie from her arms and tells her to follow him, and they start running as Armsmaster covers their retreat.

(He doesn't use his superspeed, for some reason, even after Sophia goes to Shadow form and tells him to get Eddie to safety.)

They run for a while, and then there's a strange door in the air leading to the insides of a white plastic tent, with a weird machine she doesn't recognize, and they all stepped through.

Armsmaster turns the machine off, and the door closes.

The Things are left on the other side.