Sophia Hess was Shadow Stalker.

That she is.

I tried to pull all the individual pieces and clues together, fill in the blanks.  Did this mean Emma was a cape, too?  No – I’d seen Emma in the presence of other capes.  At those times, I knew, she’d have reason to be in costume if she had powers.

Yeah, and the two times this happened, Shadow Stalker was involved, which you may recall was the reason I dismissed the idea of it being Emma Taylor had just found here very quickly.

Madison is more questionable, though.

I’m Batman. Dude, didn’t I tell you to get out of here? Scram.

But those times I was thinking of, when my cape and civilian lives had crossed?  Emma had been at the mall, where Shadow Stalker had been on duty.  She’d been at the fundraiser, too.  As Shadow Stalker’s plus one?  Emma’s dad had been there as well.  Was that a clue?

It… is possible that Emma knows Shadow Sophia’s secret, I suppose.

A sick feeling in my gut told me that Emma knew about Sophia and Shadow Stalker.

I could even guess that Emma had found out sometime before high school started, while I was at nature camp.

…

Holy shit, is this the cause of everything?

Is this why Emma betrayed Taylor? Because she discovered that her new friend was a superhero, so much cooler than Taylor?

It would have been an exciting revelation, a juicy secret, being a part of the cape community.  Seduced by that drama, Emma would have turned her back on me, became Sophia’s best friend.  The civilian sidekick and confidante to the young heroine; it was cliche, but cliches had their basis in something.

This secret is potentially a reason for most of what’s happened so far in the story, indirectly. This secret may have led to Taylor’s bullying, which led to her trigger event, which led to her becoming a cape, fighting Lung, joining the Undersiders, helping bring down Bakuda and the Arbitrary Bitrate Benefits, starting the War of the Docks, etcetera etcetera.