Hailey walks into the office and touches the light switch before the sole occupant turns around. Electric blue magic runs down her fingers as she brushes the switch, causing the lights in the building to flicker once and then go out.
“You said I should stop by?” she says.
“Really?” The voice is female, with a Midwestern lilt. “Did you just break my lights?”
“I did,” Hailey replies, projecting bravado.
With an aggrieved sigh, Erika says, “You realize I can’t see anymore, right? I have the box somewhere around here but it’s too dark for me to find it.”
“Um, sorry?”
“Can you please just turn the lights back on?”
Hailey flushes in the dark before turning back to the switch and sending another pulse. When the lights flicker back on a stylized mask of white light sits across her face, covering her eyes.
Erika regards her client. “That’s not exactly the most secretive of masks,” she says carefully.
Wordlessly, Hailey taps the side of her face and dissipates the magic, baring her face for Erika to see. Her expression projects confidence, but the subtle tremble in her hand betrays her nerves. Then, she takes a seat in front of Erika’s crowded desk. Surveying the cramped room full of law textbooks and piled documents, she shrugs, as if she has nothing to be concerned about.
Turning back to meet Erika’s eyes, Hailey says quietly, “I guess it doesn’t matter anymore.”
“Since you quit,” Erika clarifies.
Hailey nods in response.
Hesitant, she sits and the two girls look at one another for a full minute, Erika inspecting Hailey with a measured gaze that speaks to her relative age and experience while Hailey tries to maintain her stoicism under the attention.
Finally, softly, Erika comes to a decision and speaks. “Would you like the box?”
At Hailey’s nod, she pulls an unassuming cardboard box up from underneath her desk.
“I thought you said it would be hard to find?” Hailey asks.
“I lied. I wanted to see what you would do.” Erika pushes the box across her desk, shoving a pile of papers and a book out of the way as she does. “Like I said, it’s mostly photographs. I ran the number by some people I know in the Association and law enforcement. No luck. Whoever, whatever, is on the other end you’ll have to find out on your own. As for the money, it’s not much but I put it into an account. Here’s the account number.”
Hailey opens the second box from the Athow cousins tonight. With a smile, she lifts the lid to see a photo lying on top of the rest of the contents in a simple frame. The picture is of a strikingly tall woman with dyed neon pink hair in a pixie cut caught mid-motion in the wind. She has a faint smile, as if the photographer took the picture just before she was able to get fully ready. Her eyes, along with the rest of her, carry a commanding visage. Standing in front of a university building, she is wearing a casual pair of worn jeans and a raggedy t-shirt that loudly proclaims, “HWIC. Head Witch In Charge.”
Hailey grins in spite of herself as she murmurs, “Oh Bel, why am I not surprised?”
Then, setting down the framed picture she pulls out a sheet of paper with some banking information on it and folds it before putting it in her pocket. Next, she reaches in and takes out a phone number written in an unfamiliar hand.
Glancing back up at Erika she asks, “No leads?”
Erika shakes her head and says, “All I know is that it’s an international number.”
“Well,” Hailey replies, “I guess we’d better find out. No point in delaying.”
Setting the paper in front of her, she reaches for her phone in her pocket.
“Wait,” Erika cautions. “Use my office line. It’s secure.”
“You have a secure line?”
“Everyone that works for the Association does. I didn’t even have to install it. They sent a technician over when I opened the office and hooked everything up for me.”
Hailey shrugs and puts her phone back before pulling the landline over and lifting the corded phone. Then, she types in the number and waits for the dial tone.
After several rings, someone answers.
“Melinda Athow,” a Russian accent says before pausing and chuckling lightly. “You are surprised that I know your name, da?”
Hailey remains silent, some mystic nudge telling her not to speak.
“You are a vitch.” The voice on the other end of the line rumbles, deep and damaged like that of a chain smoker. “This is how you acquired my number. I know this. Here in Russia ve have vitches of our own, and one of them tells me that it vas Melinda Athow who discovers me vith her megics,” Hailey realizes it is a man speaking as the gravelly voice pauses for a crackling breath. “Vell Melinda, I know vhy you are calling me. I know vho it is you are searching for.”
Hailey raises her hand to her mouth, covering even the sound of her breathing. On the other end of the line, the voice darkens and takes on an ominous quality.
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“You are looking for Her.” The tone is accusatory, almost angry.
“And you come to me, because I can find anyone,” lightening slightly, the tone becomes more curious, “Except you, perhaps. My men have been searching, but you are very difficult to track down. But I vill find you. After all, this is vhy you contact me, da?”
The man is suddenly businesslike as he continues in short, sharp sentences. “I cannot tell you vhere she is. I do not know. But I know vhere she is going to be. I vill tell you this because ve both know vhat she plans to do. Vhy she is returning. She is searching. She thinks she can find Him there. If she finds him, she vill vake him.”
Hailey hardly dares to breathe as a hint of trepidation creeps into the voice.
“She is alvays searching, I know this. But I varn you. Something is different this time. Something has changed. Megic, perhaps?”
The tone darkens, and when the man speaks, it is with the timbre of crushed gravel. “The vound He gave me tvitched for the first time in a decade. My vitches tell me vhatever it vas that happened, He vas almost avake.”
The voice pauses, and a static hiss comes through the phone as the person on the other end lets out a slow breath.
“You are difficult to find, Melinda Athow. And you have my vord you vill remain this vay so long as she does not find him. The vorld cannot afford her master’s return. But do not call this number again. The KGB is not your friends, and ve have no vish to incur the vrath of Malefic. So you are alone, stopping her.”
The tone is foreboding as the gravel voice intones, “You vill find her in Amerika. In Liberty City. She vill arrive soon, looking for Him.”
The line falls dead. Hailey and Erika lock eyes.
“Well fu-”
Hailey lets out a loud groan that drowns out Erika.
“I just quit! I can’t fight her, I can’t handle this!” she protests. Standing, she walks over to one of Erika’s overflowing bookshelves and stares blankly ahead. “I can’t beat her. Not like this. I can’t risk losing.”
Erika stands up, pushes her chair back and stretches. “Fortunately,” she begins, “I keep something in my desk for situations like this.”
“Do you have Beacon on speed dial? Like a special emergency line?” Hailey asks, hopefully.
Laughing, Erika opens one of her desk drawers. “Oh no, although that would be convenient. I have this instead.”
Then she lifts a bottle of Tequila out of the drawer along with a pair of small glasses.
Hailey stares at her as Erika pours a couple of shots. Erika lifts a glass and proffers it to Hailey, gesturing toward the now empty chair.
“Take a seat. Get drunk. Tell me all about it.”
“I’m underage,” Hailey says dumbly as she slowly walks back over, takes the glass, and sinks into the chair.
Erika smiles and says slyly, “Technically, I don’t know that. You’re a superheroine. You could be any age under the mask.”
“I’m just a kid,” Hailey says, looking forlornly at the photograph of Belinda. “I’m not old enough to handle drinking.”
“I’ll make sure you don’t go overboard,” Erika reassures her. “I’m a responsible adult.”
Hailey giggles for a moment before stopping herself. “Right. Responsible. Plying a minor with drinks, very responsible.”
“I’m a lawyer!” Erika replies haughtily, a smile playing around her lips. “Very responsible.”
“I guess,” Hailey says before taking a cautious sip.
Her face screws up as she says, “Ugh. This stuff isn’t good.”
Erika shrugs. “It’s downright foul. I don’t keep quality alcohol in my desk, what am I some old guy on Wall Street? No, this is the worst, cheapest, highest proof tequila I can find. It’s here so I can get drunk efficiently.”
Then she throws back the glass, taking the shot down at once. Seeing her do it, Hailey does the same.
“Blech,” Hailey says. “Why do you buy this stuff again? It tastes disgusting. Even if it is cheap, this is nasty.”
“That’s the other reason,” Erika replies as she pours another pair of shots. “Wait a bit before we do the second one,” she cautions before continuing. “I want it to taste bad. Alcohol is a tactical retreat from problems, not a permanent escape. If it was good, I might not hate drinking it enough to stop.”
“Oh.” Hailey stares at the glass in her hands, swirling the liquid around idly. “Do you want to escape?”
Erika snorts and throws back her drink, stopping Hailey before she does the same with a light touch on the wrist. “I’m older, I can handle it better. And I need to be a little more tipsy for this conversation,” she explains.
“Right,” Hailey replies, setting her glass down for a bit as Erika pours herself a third.
“I always want to escape,” Erika begins with a sad smile. “My whole family is dead. Everyone that loved me is gone. Everyone I loved, gone.” She looks up from her drink and meets Hailey’s eyes. “When I got this office, I had nobody to tell. I send Beacon an email, but he didn’t see it. I guess the Thirteen were stirring up trouble at the time and he was busy all day. So I sat here, finally a lawyer, a real one with a real office and a steady job and an actual client,” she nods to Hailey and adds, “thanks for that, by the way, and I just worked. I can honestly say I had nothing else to do.”
“How do you deal?”
“The work never ends,” Erika replies with forced nonchalance. “I just keep moving.”
“That’s it?”
“I could lie,” Erika says with a snort, a hint of the alcohol showing itself in a flush in her cheeks. “I could say that I’m doing all this to honor them or something. But I’m not. Loss is just a hollow feeling, and nothing you ever achieve or drink or do will ever fill that empty space.”
“I know,” Hailey whispers, sad and lost.
Erika fixes her with a long look. “Yeah. I suppose you might. Drink up.”
Hailey nods and forces down the shot with a grimace. “I don’t know what to do.”
“Get to work?” Erika asks.
“What if I fail again?” Hailey asks with a haunted look in her eyes.
Erika leans back in her chair and says in a nonchalant voice, “Then Becca eats your family in front of you. Personally, I find failure much more painful than success. Which is why I work so hard.”
In spite of herself, Hailey laughs. “That’s it? You just keep going?”
“Yeah, that’s it. There’s no magic trick to dealing with this, you just have to keep going. Some days really suck, but that’s what I have the tequila for,”
Hailey stares at her empty glass for a minute, thinking long and hard about Erika’s words. Then, she lifts up the glass and holds it in front of Erika, silently asking for another drink.
“Okay. That’s not so bad. Just… keep going. I can do that. Tomorrow,” she says, “I’ll put the mask back on and figure out this Malefic thing. Tomorrow.”
With a raised eyebrow, Erika tops off both their glasses and nods. “Tomorrow it is. That’s your last one by the way. I’m not dealing with a drunk witch.”
“Drunk? Oh, my parents are going to kill me,” Hailey says, more than a little tipsy.
Erika laughs and replies, “Hey! At least you still have them.”
Face flushed, Hailey apologizes, “Sorry! I didn’t mean-”
Erika, however, waves off her concern. “I know.”
“They, um, they’ve been lying to me about something,” Hailey blurts out. “I don’t know how to handle it.”
“Well I’ve got no experience in that area,” Erika apologizes. “But if they’re alive… Well that’s at least something, trust me.”
“Yeah, I guess it’s something,” Hailey says as she reaches back into the box and lifts out the photo of Belinda. Silently, she runs her fingers along the glass separating her from the old photograph and thinks.
A warning that heralds the return of Malefic; the flame-wielding woman who killed Hailey’s best friend and turned her into a superheroine! Who is she searching for? And why Liberty City? Questions that will be addressed, but not tonight! The story continues with the dawn in… “Hangover!”