Sofie Olsen Bergen was born on the 3rd of January of 2000, in the main hospital of Philadelphia.

During Marianne’s pregnancy, nothing could’ve indicated what they were about to experience after birth. Sofie came into the world, opened her eyes, cried, the umbilical cord was cut, and before she could be put into Marianne’s arms, before her father, present in the room, could hug her tight, her throat began collapsing.

The nurses and doctors immediately took her away. It took one week for Erik and Marianne to see her for the first time, at a safe distance. The doctors warned them not to get too attached. For over two weeks, she stayed in intensive care. Her body was attacking itself, and no one could understand why. An unknown autoimmune disease, they ended up realizing.

Once she stabilized, that was good enough to send her to her parents, with the warning that her immune system was hyperactive and that even immunosuppressants weren’t doing anything to it.

Erik and Marianne kept a close eye on her for years, protecting her from the outside world. But all the care didn’t prevent her from collapsing on her bedroom’s floor in November 2004. Her lungs, heart, and liver needed the machines to function. She fell into a state of almost comatose.

It took her almost three years, on her birthday, the 3rd of January of 2007, for Sofie to finally regain consciousness. For her blue eyes to see the world again. For her to see her big sister for the first time.

She wouldn’t say it, but coming back from the death, like she did, wasn’t without consequences. Sofie was haunted by death. She grabbed the knife at breakfast to put her jam on her slice of bread, and she’d see herself cutting her wrists with it. Unconsciously she’d tap two times her two fingers, index and middle, from her right hand and that’d bring her some comfort.

When she visited the lake with her family, she’d see herself drowning in it, she’d tap her fingers and look away. They’d take her to a bridge to see the view, to a skyscraper, and she’d see herself jumping off of it, she’d tap her fingers and shake her head. She’d be in Marianne’s car and she’d see the car hitting a wall only on her side, she’d tap her fingers. She’d see the trains passing by and she’d see herself jumping in front of it. She’d tap her fingers.

She was still ten years old, when she made peace with death, she didn’t want to die, but if she saw herself over and over dying, committing suicide too, then that must have meant she wanted it deep down. Wanted it all to be over.

She was thirteen years old when Marianne comes back alone. M, stop hiding. Megan was nowhere to be found. Marianne didn’t have to utter a word. When Erik died, her face had the same look. Megan was dead. She runs back upstairs, shuts the curtains, turns off every light of Megan’s room, and lies in her bed.

She’s on her computer on the next morning when she sees the video of Megan destroying the Ariston community. Her father’s white hoodie. She recognizes it immediately. M… you wouldn’t do this. Sofie holds her sister’s clothes tighter than before.

At least with her father there was a funeral, but not for Megan, and the worse of it all is that Marianne refuses to talk about her. Refuses to answer the few questions Sofie has. How she died, which Sofie knows already, but wants to hear it from Marianne.

So Sofie stops talking altogether. She only answers her tutors by writing and won’t even speak to Marianne.

Marianne is having breakfast, a black coffee, when Sofie comes by. It’s been a week since Megan died. Sofie writes in a piece of paper and hands it over to her mother.

“I want to have kung fu lessons and learn how to shoot, there’s a shooting range 15 minutes away and a kung fu studio 10 walking. I need you to pay for it,” Marianne reads it out loud and looks at her daughter, “seems like you have it all figured out, Sofie, but aren’t you forgetting a tiny detail?”

Sofie shakes her head in disagreement.

“Your autoimmune disease can regress unexpectedly. You study at home because of it. Going out with others can pose risks for you.”

Sofie writes incredibly fast and hands it over to her mother.

“Ok, then hire the kung fu instructor to come here and hire the shooting center to be just me for an hour with someone teaching me,” Marianne reads it and sighs, “hire, hire, hire.”

Sofie writes it down once more and passes it to her.

“Use my inheritance if money is an issue,” Marianne tries to keep her cool when reading this last bit, “money isn’t an issue, Sofie. I’m just concerned, and I want to know why you want to learn kung fu and shooting.”

Sofie begins writing down and Marianne takes the pencil out of her hand.

“Say it, daughter,” she says in Norwegian and faces her.

“To protect myself, mother. The world is a dangerous place. I want to be able to protect myself,” she replies in English.

Marianne nods and promises to make the calls later that day. Sofie keeps staring at her.

“Anything else?” Marianne asks in Norwegian.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

“I want to visit dad’s grave. Every now and then. I studied the bus route there-” Sofie replies in English.

“You are not taking any bus. Tell me whenever you want to, and I’ll drive you there.”

On the next day, Sofie goes to the shooting range during lunch, she has the room all to herself and the instructor explains all about gun safety. She smiles when she fires it for the first time. Her first kung fu lesson goes well too and it’s the only two activities throughout her day that she genuinely takes pleasure of. Her tutoring bores her, all the things she has to learn, and despite liking her tutor, he’s almost ten years older than her. There isn’t much that they have in common, not that Sofie would know what she has in common with other 12 year olds.

When Sofie turns 16, in 2016, she tricks her tutor on a library break and buys black hair dye. For a while now that her clothes had all turned black, the only accessorize that stood out was her shoes, always red. Ever since her father bought her the first pair when she was three. Ever since all her shoes had to be red, she said so and wouldn’t accept anything else.

Ever since the day that Megan died that Sofie wanted to paint her hair black, the blondness of it all, and especially the similarity to Marianne’s hair made her stop looking at herself in the mirror. She wouldn’t face it and would act out whenever Marianne tried to touch it, comb it, style it like she used to.

Oh, Marianne will hate to see what I did to my precious hair. She laughs after paying for it.

It’s late in the evening, Marianne leaves to meet with the Council, and Sofie reads the instructions of the hair dye, applies it, and she’s finally free. She looks in the mirror and sees her black hair. None of the blonde in sight. She hides it from Marianne for the entire weekend.

“Is it permanent?” is all Marianne asks.

Sofie tells her no and that it’s her hair, she can do with it whatever she wants. Marianne agrees, but explains that permanent changes can’t be reversed, even if we regret them, we have to learn to live with them instead.

***

December 2017

Sofie is done with her training, she says goodbye to her trainer and focuses on the homework she has for the next day. Her phone blows up with notifications from the news.

Back from death: The Angel of Death returns. Who is Megan Grant? Matthew Moore’s daughter partners with the Angel of Death. How scared should we be of the new terrorist movement? The Five are back but are only Two this time. Rachel Moore and the Angel of Death, the new face of terror. The headlines read.

She rushes to watch the video and drops her phone when Megan’s face shows. It is her. Older, her hair is shorter now, but it is her. Dressed all in black and speechless. Rachel Moore is doing all the talking and Megan’s green eyes are expressionless.

Sofie texts her mother right away asking her to come home as soon as possible. Marianne sees it and leaves her office in the university and heads to the organization instead, she meets in her office with Laurence and Edward.

“You all saw the video?” Edward asks and they nod. “I don’t believe in the devil, but the specimen almost makes me believe in it. It survived that day, how? That light went straight to it.”

“The terrorist movement will be useful to us, people are already scared, the name Moore carries too much weight, adding to the Angel of Death. People fear them already and they haven’t done anything,” Laurence smiles.

“Your daughter is a liability, though, Marianne,” Edward focuses on her, “she’s been here, grew up with the specimen. If she talks…”

“She won’t,” Marianne faces him.

“That she won’t. We’ll have a mental controller erase her memories of the specimen and of the factory.” Edward puts his hand on her shoulder.

“That won’t be needed. Laurence,” she looks at him, “you can make a video of Erik being killed by her blue light. Sofie won’t understand that it’s a fake. She’ll hate it and will never tell anyone, that I’m sure, I know her.”

“Sir?” Laurence meets Edward’s eyes.

“Erasing memories has devastating effects on the brain. She’ll go to university soon. Please, Edward. She has lost enough,” Marianne’s eyes fill with tears.

“Sure. What is she planning on studying?”

“Same as me.” Marianne says.

“Perfect, a few more years and she could join us, Marianne! Two Dr. Olsen under the same roof.” Edward smiles and Marianne forces a smile too.

“When do you need the video, Marianne?” Laurence asks.

“Now? She’s asking me to go home. She’ll ask about the specimen.”

Laurence nods and they go to his floor, his team makes the video in little over one hour and Marianne thanks him before leaving.

She finally arrives past dinner time at home. As soon as she opens the door, Sofie runs toward her.

“You saw the video? Megan’s alive! I’m sure she’ll come and meet us soon!” Sofie’s eyes glow.

Marianne puts her hands on her shoulders and sits her down on the couch.

“Sofie, there’s something you need to know. I don’t think Megan did it on purpose… she just got scared… or something triggered a response in her. She…” Marianne takes a deep breath and looks deeply into her daughter’s eyes, “she was the one who killed dad.”

“Megan? Megan killed dad?” Sofie shakes her head and Marianne hugs her tight.

“She must’ve felt awful about it, Sofie. She loved him-”

Sofie pushes her away and faces her, “Megan killed dad?” Sofie focuses on Marianne’s eyes.

“Yes,” Marianne holds back a tear and looks away. She grabs her phone and shows Sofie the video. Erik pulling Megan into a room. There’s no sound but Megan trembles, paces around and eventually raises her blue hand and fires it.

Sofie gets up and runs upstairs. She breaks everything in Megan’s old room. While shouting, she grabs a photo of her and Megan and smashes the frame on the floor, she leaves to her room and slams the door shut.

Marianne goes in there, grabs the photo with the broken frame and puts it in her room, inside the bedside table.

***

January 2018

Since her father died that all birthday celebrations died too. It became a day like any other. No cake, no birthday wishes or acknowledgement for that fact. Her eighteenth birthday wouldn’t be any different, she knew it already.

To her surprise, Marianne asks her to come outside and Sofie has her father’s car there waiting for her, finally fixed, after all those years.

“It’s yours.” Marianne smiles. “Also, I have what you asked for,” she hands her a certificate, “I know I wasn’t so receptive at first, but you’ve been asking for it for a year now. So, here it is. You should’ve chosen Sophia, easier for the Americans to pronounce it closer to its original sound.”

Sophie Hemming Myers born on the 20th of September of 2000 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States of America. Daughter of Elizabeth Jefferson Hemming and Christopher Adams Myers.

Sophie Olsen Bergen died on the 3rd of January of 2018.

“I’d still prefer if you moved to Norway. There are plenty of good schools there. Me and father did our undergraduate in Oslo. You’d love the city.” Marianne says in Norwegian.

“Oh, I would move there by myself. All alone. You won’t come, Marianne?” Sofie replies in English.

“I have important work to do here.” Marianne maintains the tone and language.

More important than me. Than us. Sofie looks away, trying to hold back her tears from forming.