[INDENT][COLOR=SLATEGRAY]
[CENTER][img]https://i0.wp.com/nevermoreniche.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/dispatch-torrance.png?resize=1024%2C514&ssl=1[/img]
[color=#D4AF37][h1]S D N   C L A R E M O N T[/h1][/color]
[sup][i]Friday · 16:58 · Break Room[/i][/sup][/CENTER]
[hr]
[COLOR=darkgray][indent][color=#40B4C4]"I did my job."[/color] Nadia's tone was a little less animated as James approached her on her second arrival to the SDN building, not bothering to look up from her phone as she tapped away, resting against the wall close to the balcony entrance she had already decided she preferred to any more pedestrian access. [color=#40B4C4]"Team management? Kinda sounds like your job, M."[/color] A hint of her wit returned as she finished thumbing through a message, a hint of a coy tone as she pulled from a repository of Bond references suitable for the ribbing of any person from that side of the Atlantic. She was on the move already though, her wings tucked in as they often were, they still had the habit of brushing those she passed with the hint of a feather.[/indent][/COLOR]

[hr]
[CENTER][color=#D4AF37][h1]S D N   C L A R E M O N T[/h1][/color]
[sup][i]Friday · 17:05 · Changing Rooms[/i][/sup][/CENTER]
[hr]
[COLOR=darkgray][indent]It was her first time actually in the changing rooms for the heroes at Claremont and she had all the impression of being decidedly 'whelmed' hardly worse than she might have feared but certainly not better than she may have hoped. She wasn't prudish and had little issue with sharing on that front, she just liked her space, and more importantly, space to put [i]things[/i]. Speaking of things, one of many messages she had sent across the day had ensured her dress would be delivered to the centre while she had been working, and once finding the locker assigned to her, it was a simple matter to swing it open to find it in place. She allowed herself a hum of satisfaction while she examined it, just before her phone rang again.

[color=#40B4C4]"Oh look, Jerry, changed your mind yet?"[/color] Nadia allowed the bitterness to touch her tone as she began the process of removing the dress, and accompanying heels, from her locker.

[color=#8B7355]"On dumping my ungrateful screw up of a client? Na, this a courtesy you don't deserve."[/color] Jerry had a gritty Bronx accent and half of the charm, but he was a cutthroat agent. That had been a benefit to her for years, but less so when all of a sudden it was her that needed to be cut to save face.

[color=#40B4C4]"Nice to hear from you too, what the fuck do you want?"[/color] Despite the escalation in language, her tone actually evened out. This was more par for the course with their conversations.

[color=#8B7355]"I got the Met's preservation society on the fuckin' line asking about a dress they loaned my agency in good faith, and now I can find the damn thing. So, do I need to instruct you on the finer points of property ownership, your highness?"[/color] Even with the accusation she couldn't hear true upset from the man on the other end, just the harshness of a man who already knew he was speaking to the culprit.

[color=#40B4C4]"I seem to recall they loaned it to you on the exact instruction I was wearing it? Sorry Jerry, I'm from a time when oaths meant something beyond property laws."[/color] She allowed something of an accent to creep into her tone, far from the vaguely exotic speech she sometimes adopted to impress, but the one she had picked up first from sixteen years of cheering for the Cubs.

[color=#8B7355]"Yeah and where's that? Englewood?"[/color]

[color=#40B4C4]"Screw you Jerry, you know I'm from Garfield."[/color]

[color=#8B7355]"Yeah well don't let your deep dish ass stretch that thing out, or I'm throwing you to the wolves on this one."[/color]

[color=#40B4C4]"Not going to be a problem Jerry, I already had it altered."[/color]

She hung up as the raging stream of expletives began, all the time admiring the shimmering scope of the dress she held before her. It probably cost more than her current combined net worth, but it was also the sort of thing people had become used to seeing her in at events, and so, downgrading was out of the question.

Getting out of her suit, as it often did, ended up being a more challenging struggle than the actual events of her dispatch, and she didn't even have time to relax into the relief of not being quite so cinched before she began getting changed into the sparkling gown. The body, cascading in glimmering gemstones, was embellished with ruffles of white ostrich feathers at the shoulders and hem of the tail. What had been rather fetching cutouts at the hips were now rather useful for her as gaps for her wings as she began the process of pulling it on.

Of course, she was rather used to attendants, and the final issue eventually presented itself. The perils of a back facing binding, the corset-style bindings up the back of the dress that would be hidden seamlessly as soon as they were closed outside of easy reach. With an sigh, Nadia called out as she heard the presence of someone else in the locker room, switching seamlessly back out of the Chicago accent to her speech.

[color=#40B4C4]"Hey, a hand here? I promise to offer it back."[/color]

Lightning Girl's boots clattered against floor, as she caught the look of Ikret looking over her shoulder, Sophie's own dress in hands, popping it down on the bench by her locker.

[color=#C0C0C0]"Sure. You won't want to keep them unless you like getting tazed. Anyway, with a dress like that, you must have contacts in the Egyptian Pantheon!"[/color] She joked, a little bit of that English sarcasm dripping in, even though that was definitely not her norm. No, she was more fun-loving, a little more positive and nice, but hey, she had to build a rapport.

Ikret's wings were beautiful in the cutouts, but from one girl to another, she could just make out the alterations. And the gown being a lot like her own. Fuck. They were both so similar. But she had the confidence to ditch that visor and show her face. That much Lightning Girl had known, she'd been in DTLA, of course. She wondered, was she just one at the same, the visor just another piece of costume? Comfortable in being the same? Sophie had been more open lately. Maybe America was changing her. Either way, Ikret had the same look. And while deep down she was a teeny bit upset, she couldn't deny that Ikret probably pulled rank on that. Even if she was a Phoenix. Damn. That was fucking weird, learning that.

Pulling on the straps, Lighting Girl's rubber gloved hands were strong, cinching Ikret in, hiding the bindings inside the dress. It was similar, she kept on thinking. Well…..hardly a shock, in the literal sense when she had finished pulling her in.

[color=#C0C0C0]"I'm kidding, don't answer that. Your dress is stunning. Really, really pretty. Those almost look like real diamonds."[/color] She quickly wanted to cut off the fact Americans didn't do sarcasm. Especially a heroine like Ikret. She had to be probably a bit more serious, right? Well, either way. This was one hell of a dress. Holy shit, that must have been worth so much money, the detail finally popping.

[color=#40B4C4]"They are."[/color] She caught her reflection in the mirror across the room and adjusted one shoulder fractionally. [color=#40B4C4]"The dress is on loan from the Met. To my former agent. Who is currently having a very bad afternoon."[/color] She took a few test extensions of her wings, not quite to full flex given their confines, but just enough to test that the flex of the muscles beneath the skin of her lower back wouldn't fit irregularly with the cutouts. Her fingers traced up the shimmering stones on her form as she did, letting her nails tip tap across them.

She turned from the mirror, the feathers at her shoulders settling with the movement, and looked at Lightning Girl properly for the first time.

[color=#40B4C4]"First one of these?"[/color]

Lightning Girl caught that glimpse, and smiled, nodding, innocent, but still having that lust for life that she usually went into situations with. An optimism that really felt like it didn't fit the accent. [color=#C0C0C0]"Yeah. First one in LA. I'm proper excited."[/color] She took a glimpse of the dress, watching how Ikret flexed her wings, a grin forming.

[color=#C0C0C0]"I suppose it would be gathering dust if you didn't. What's the phrase…..easier to ask for forgiveness than it is for permission? Oh well, I won't say anything if you don't!"[/color]

On that note with a giddy grin, she walked across the room, breathing out, mask pushed up for a second so she could soak her face, and try and wipe any remaining residues away, before pushing it back down, looking back and knowing Ikret was still sorting herself out in her corner of the locker rooms. Pulling her arms over her small of her back, she fought to pull the zipper from the inside out with the little cord coming loose, and peeled away the material, using it to then peel her arms and gloves off, bit by bit, little by little revealing her body.

Nadia would see Sophie's back, and would have seen the scars across her body, from side to legs, as she folded the smelly, sweaty cordura-based costume up and peeled out the silvery number from her SDN-branded backpack, still in her bra and underwear, Sophie's body sculpted by the power she had, and the sessions she put in to work it up.

She wasn't uncomfortable pulling off her costume around another hero, not when at least it wasn't some guy gawking, she assumed Nadia wasn't quite like that. With a relatively graceful pull of the dress's various fibres, she was clad in silver, walking barefoot across the tiles and awkwardly peeling her arms over and through the holes in the sides, revealing where some burn marks from swimming through shit remained from earlier, aware she had to probably cake herself up a little bit more with something to get rid of the last bits of odour, or at least, mask it. Her heels were aside from her, as she fitted up, looking across to Ikret, who had been watching away at her.

[color=#40B4C4]"Tough day?"[/color] Some who knew Nadia and her reputation better would likely struggle to label her as particularly empathetic, but she did have an easy personable charisma to her that occasionally broke through the visage of the uncaring internet personality. She was thumbing through a phone again, but looked up enough from her screen to catch both Lightning Girl's struggles and her form, her eyes tracing muscles and scars as a pattern of the wider whole, rather than separate aspects. [color=#40B4C4]"I've had a few of those lately, still, these sort of things are a nice distraction."[/color]

Sophie tsk'd, as if to feel like she was the same, rather than disapproval. [color=#C0C0C0]"Yeah. This is nice. Almost forgot it was a shit day……literally.."[/color] She was tucking herself in, pulling the gloves over hands, up to elbows, quickly heading to the sink and giving herself a quick splash with more perfume, trying to mask. She was seeing another side of Ikret, quite literally without the visor., when it came to the other aspect. All of this. Her being here, DTLA far from home. Shit, Sophie didn't want to say it, but Ikret was sort of someone she looked up to. And reality was different. It usually was, the literal phrase, don't meet your

[color=#C0C0C0]"I know the feeling. It gets better. Usually it has to. Been a few my end too so something's gotta give."[/color] She gave an optimistic hint, but it didn't seem totally sold. The empathy was there, Sophie was warm, trying, hopeful, even out of costume, there was clearly someone trying to cling to it. But cling was all she had.

Nadia was busy for the first few moments attempting to get an angle of herself, and the dress, with her phone camera that she was happy with and so didn't immediately look over. When she did, a beat later, it was at the silver dress rather than Sophie still getting into it.

A pause.

[color=#40B4C4]"We're going to walk in looking like a set."[/color] She looked back at her own reflection, something between a grimace and amusement crossing her face. [color=#40B4C4]"You didn't think to mention that while you were getting hands on?"[/color] Her tone was teasing in a mischievous way, but there was a hard edge to her words which suggested something a little less than playful.

Sophie smirked, with only the kind of grin that kind of comment had. 'Okay, Ikret', she thought to herself. 'I wasn't going to say anything'. She sized up her dress up, and then folded her arms over, blowing a strand of hair aside.

[color=#C0C0C0]"Didn't realise you had a similar taste till I was pulling you in. But I suppose…...suppose…..fuck, we match."[/color] She seemed almost a bit absent minded there with a sly grin, as she turned, the dress having a little bit of a tail to it, as she swirled on the heel she'd left ready, foot slotted in, still fitting like it had quite from some time ago.

[color=#C0C0C0]"But, I suppose you showed me up, I mean, diamonds, a Met dress…..damn. We'll just have to make sure to stay out of each other's photos. You have more shimmer than me. And I can't be stealing Miss Downtown's thunder."[/color] Sophie chuckled, letting go of it fairly quick, not wanting to make this seem rude, seeing the phone in her hand.

[color=#C0C0C0]"Do you want a picture for socials? Or are you gonna preen like a peacock?"[/color] She backhand complimented back, hand at the ready, knowing she had some lip to apply but apart from that, was ready to go. She would get a photo of herself later, something for the socials, but knew they were up against it time wise.

[color=#40B4C4]"That would be sensible."[/color] Nadia mused with a deliberately overacted thinking face, before instead moving into action. Standing directly beside Sophie, she arched herself before holding her phone up and above them, aimed down at the pair. Her other hand, two fingers held together, she held aloft, angled between her face and the camera, before speaking with a half-laugh. [color=#40B4C4]"Pose."[/color] After taking the snap, she examined the photo for a moment. As well practiced as she was, the position of her two fingers across her own face mimicked the silhouette of her mask, covering her eyes in mimicry of Superhero anonymity, without obscuring the full purse of her lips. [color=#40B4C4]"Wouldn't want anyone to think I was hiding from you."[/color] She teased further, before sweeping away with a flutter of feathers and a glitter of diamonds.

[color=#40B4C4]"Come along, let's go have fun."[/color]

Lightning Girl smiled, grinning with a teethy smile, white hair brushed aside to one side past her shoulder, not having a pose to give other than smiley white-haired heroine, hand by hip, and that classic look. She had done this quite some time, but didn't have that out and out power that Ikret clearly had to be splendid in selfies. And that Ikret did have something of a heart after all!

Sophie could could beam, get the looks, but, it relied on something other than creativity. She admitted internally that aspect of it Ikret had was something she couldn't nail as easy as these shiny heroes that were coming through these days. But something about Ikret was maybe felt… eternal. Like this bit was new but the rest was vintage. She couldn't say, but with wings like that, and a presence, Lightning Girl didn't feel so old at all relatively, even if her usual suit and look felt as vintage to heroes of old as they came.

[color=#C0C0C0]"Hah, guess you can't hide when we look this!"[/color] She excitedly replied, although hurriedly, the electricity binding a little.

She looked across to the maskless Egyptian-American, with a grin still plastered on her face, heels clacking on tile floor, fixing her mask a little, exhaling out, her arm still by hip, dress hugging her form in a tight embrace. Ikret may have had diamonds, and those wings that felt like they jutted a long, long way out, but Sophie had a feeling this downtown heroine was someone she'd just have to up her game for. Someone she'd maybe not instantly find a groove with, but here and now, it felt all alive. All coming up Lightning Girl and Ikret.

[color=#C0C0C0]"Hell yeah. Let's go paint the town, Ikret. I don't think they're missing us, at all.."[/color] With that, she turned on her heel, an eye over her shoulder, and headed towards the door, blasting the door with a well practiced bolt to smack the latch, not needing to even push to get the door moving but without blasting it off hinges. But enough to make an entrance, where she could walk out and wait out on James, Blackstar, Asteroid and Hat Trick.[/indent][/COLOR]
[/COLOR][/INDENT]