Sophie’s Choice

This wasn’t how it was supposed to feel.

Sophie pushed through the door of her Southside apartment and made her way to the liquor cabinet next to the fridge. She poured a double shot of whiskey with trembling hands and downed it. The warmth passed into her chest, mixing with the adrenaline so that she barely felt the drink. There was only one answer for that problem. Pouring another. She took her second double and dropped onto the red cushions of her loveseat.

The neon lights of a Boardwalk casino bathed the small living room in flashing red and gold. Usually she was used to it, but tonight those lights were vibrant. Everything was. From the ticking of the analog clock above the door to the clinking of ice in her shaking glass. She could even feel the nicotine stains that filled the building’s air on her skin. Fourteen years she had waited. And now it was finished. Adrian Eldritch was dead.

The man who had taken her life, twice, was no more. And yet, that cavernous hole in heart; the empty pit that threatened to swallow her every day was still there. Why was that? Sophie had done what she set out to do. She had fulfilled the vow she made to her sixteen year old self. How was that already fourteen years ago?

For some reason, she could only think of Fletch, the beautiful idiot she’d used in her plan. She wondered what his face had looked like behind the vault door when she laid her cards on the table. He had been sweet, if lacking a little finesse. Sophie couldn’t think about that. She knew this was going to happen when she selected him as her way into the Freedom League Dark.

If anyone was going to find where Adrian had hidden himself it was them. She didn’t want to hurt them, they were relatively innocent in all this. Fletch wasn’t even a magic-user for God’s sake. But she needed to get to Adrian.

Her thoughts drifted back through the years. An exercise she had perfected after clawing back from the dark place Adrian had placed her mind. He robbed her of her identity, tried to place her in a “perfect” world, while denying her who she was meant to be. Adrian decided that on his own, and he defined perfect. Giving her up to a suburban family in Emerald City, thinking that was the end of it. But the mind of a mage isn’t so easily broken. Especially the mind of a Master Mage.

That was Sophie’s destiny, not to grow up to be a doctor or lawyer or whatever passed for the American Dream now. She was supposed to replace Adrian, as Earth’s greatest sorceress. The parents Adrian gave her were good people, but they were normal people who wanted normal things. That was like Hell.

Sophie took another sip from the whiskey and walked over to the window. Across the way, she could make out Freedom City’s skyline, with Freedom Hall shining bright in the night sky. Every day she was bombarded with the news of superheroes battling supervillains across the world. For a while she couldn’t remember who she was, but each news report dug into her subconscious like an archeologist searching for hidden wonders. Eventually, pieces of herself began to surface.

It was a rush at first, feeling the taste of magic again. Keeping her abilities secret, in case Adrian had instructed her parents to tell him if she began to manifest again. That rush gave way to cold anger, and the pit in her heart. It was worse when Adrian “died” and Seven took his place.

Sophie snarled in disgust when she thought of Seven’s name. She wasn’t even strong enough to fight Una with four other heroes helping her. How did she get to stay Adrian’s apprentice? She was a decent enough mage, but Master Mage material? Not with a hundred years of training. Sophie was relieved when she died, not happy, but grateful that the Master Mage energy would once more be up for the taking. She was twenty then, and for the last ten years she wondered why the energy never came.

It wasn’t because she wasn’t strong enough. She practiced her magic every day, even created her own Cloak of Flight to replace the one Adrian took from her. Una must have done something to prevent a new Master Mage from being named. That was the only logical explanation. Or it went back to Adrian. Now that he was gone, maybe, just maybe the mantle would finally pass to her.

Sophie downed the rest of her drink and looked down at the glass. The triangular pattern in the crystal looked like arrowheads. Fletch again. Her body shivered as a tear slid down her cheek. She barely heard the glass slam into the wall before she turned to enter her bedroom, hoping the pit wouldn’t feel so empty when she awoke.