Flicker

The night smelled like wet concrete and old iron—a sharp, metallic bite beneath the constant stink of Gotham’s back alleys. Sera moved carefully through the maze of rusted scaffolding and rain-slicked rooftops, her silhouette shifting unnaturally against the city’s neon reflections. She was half-there, half-not, a ripple in the air, her body blurring at the edges like an old photograph degrading in real-time.

She flickered.

Not voluntarily—never voluntarily. The phase instability had been getting worse. Too long without a stabilizer shot, too much exertion. One moment, she was pressed against a rooftop ventilation shaft, heart hammering, watching the streets below. The next—gravity gave out, her body slipping between states, and her stomach lurched as she sank knee-deep into the roof like she’d been caught in quicksand.

Sera gritted her teeth and forced herself back into sync, her molecules knitting themselves together with a shuddering ripple of heat distortion. A sharp exhale, hands bracing against the cold metal surface. Her fingers left behind a faint afterimage, a smudged mirage of where they had been a second ago.

Not good.

She needed to move. She needed cover.

Down below, the backstreets pulsed with the low hum of Gotham’s criminal ecosystem—dealers, runners, and low-level enforcers moving like rats in the belly of the city. She wasn’t the only ghost drifting through these alleys tonight. The Falcone and Maroni remnants had been at each other’s throats for weeks, and now Black Mask’s people were starting to circle like vultures. Too many eyes. Too much heat. And someone—something—had been shadowing her route for the last two nights.

STAR Labs? A bounty hunter? Another Bat?

She wasn’t waiting to find out.

She pulled the scarf up over her mouth, adjusted the fit of her blackout goggles, and dropped down into the narrow space between two buildings. Her boots barely made a sound as she landed, knees bending to absorb the impact. She melted into the dark, nothing but a whisper of heat distortion against the cityscape.

She just needed to keep moving.

One step ahead. One breath at a time.

And for once, stay solid long enough to make it through the night.