Death Stare

Two years ago, I was one of the Disease Control Agency's best researchers. But while I was investigating a batch of virus samples with unsequenced genetic codes, my husband's true love burned me to death. She poured rubbing alcohol over the virus samples she accidentally dropped and rendered me unconscious with diethyl ether. Then, she set the lab on fire and burned everything to a crisp. When the agency's other employees led the firefighters to the scene, she cried and claimed I'd stolen the virus samples after colluding with an unknown organization. A month later, an odd and aggressive virus spread throughout the city, leading to countless deaths. My husband, Ethan Carter, denounced and severed ties with me before getting together with his true love. The whole city turned on me, crying for my blood. Everyone said I was a spy from an external power. That changes when three daring high school students accidentally stumble upon the cordoned-off lab. They discover my charred body inside.

Two months after I died, it finally occurred to my parents that they'd forgotten to bring me back from their trip. My father scowled in frustration. "She was supposed to walk back herself. Does she really need to make such a big deal out of it?" My brother, ever smug, opened our chat and sent an emoji, along with a message. [You'd better die out there. That way, Scarlett and I will split Grandma's inheritance.] He received no reply. With a frosty expression, my mother said, "Tell her if she shows up for her grandmother's birthday on time, I'll let the whole pushing-Scarlett-into-the-water thing go." They never believed I hadn't made it out of those woods. After digging six feet into the ground, they finally found my bones deep in the forest.

While they slice me apart, I desperately call my brother, Nathan Slade. He finally picks up as my consciousness starts to slip and answers in an annoyed voice, "What now?" "Nathan, help—" I don't get to finish before he cuts me off. "Can't you ever go a day without drama? Gemma's graduation is at the end of the month. Miss it, and I swear I'll kill you!" Then, he hangs up without a second thought. The agonizing pain swallows me whole, and my eyes close for good, tears still trailing down my cheeks. Well, good news, Nathan… You won't have to kill me because I'm already dead.

My boyfriend is a forensic artist. He was forced to make a harrowing decision to save his first love. At the killer's demand, he created a portrait from a photo—he never realized that the young girl in the photo was me in my childhood. Two weeks later, the police investigate a grisly bomb explosion and dismemberment case. The victim's identity was unrecognizable, and the investigation dragged on for days as the authorities desperately searched the blast site, looking for my remains. After three days and nights, they finally recovered enough of my remains to reconstruct my face. When my boyfriend unknowingly brought the shattered fragments back to life with his art, he was confronted with a horrifying truth—one that drove him to the edge of madness.

On my son’s birthday, my husband had asked his first love to pick our son up from our home. While I stubbornly refused to let him go, a huge fire broke out in the hallway during our standoff. I was struck by falling debris, and blood started streaming from my head. However, my son was unharmed as he lay beneath me. My husband, who was a firefighter, came forward to rescue us. But he handed the only gas mask he had to his first love. “Miss Leia has a weaker constitution. Dad, please get her out first. Mom, wait for the other firefighters to save you!” I watched them leave with a faint, bitter smile. It appeared that they had both forgotten my severe asthma and the fact that I would die without a gas mask.

Right after my bonding ceremony with Alpha Carlo, his first love, Olivia, died unexpectedly. For fifty years after that, I gave everything I had for Carlo and the Shadowmoon pack. We had five pups, and the pack thrived. But then, on the 50th anniversary of me becoming Luna, Carlo dragged me to the Moonlit Platform. He was going to break our mate bond himself. And after he brutally severed it, he drained all my soul power. He said he was going to use an ancient ritual to bring Olivia back to life. And I, the Luna who’d been by his side for half a century, was the perfect vessel. My desperate cries brought our children running, but they just stood behind Carlo, watching me with cold eyes. “Bringing Aunt Olivia back is the only thing Father has wanted for years,” one said. “If you hadn’t been jealous of Aunt Olivia, if you’d used your healing on her, you wouldn’t be our mother!” another spat. The children I’d poured my heart and soul into raising now just wanted me to die. I felt my soul shatter, my heart ache as if pierced by a knife, and then, nothing. I lost consciousness. When I opened my eyes again, I was back. Back to the day of my bonding ceremony with Carlo. In my last life, Carlo chose me, his Head Healer. Olivia, though, was devoured by a venom-fang spider and died from its poison. Her death had nothing to do with me, but Carlo blamed me for all of it. This time, looking into Carlo's eyes, I saw the deep disgust there, and any hope I had left died. He was back too.

As my murderer's claws tear into my abdomen inch by inch, my father and brother are seated in our family's banquet hall. They're celebrating Carly's 18th birthday and coming-of-age. "You'll always be my little girl." "Happy birthday, Carly." They light 18 pink candles for her. On top of the exquisite red velvet cake is a wolf figurine that they carved for her, and there are well wishes and laughter all around. Meanwhile, I'm curled up in a sewer filled with liquid silver as I bleed to death. My phone has been crushed, and I can't get out. I can only cry for help. A few days later, my father and brother show up together at the autopsy room. My brother stands by the operating table with a scalpel. He slices open the body and sews it back up like it's nothing. My father just covers his nose as he shoots a disgusted glance at my body. He urges my brother to hurry up with the autopsy report. "The victim is a young female wolf presumed to be of pure lineage. Before her death, she was subjected to prolonged captivity and torture. Her throat is nearly severed, her cervical spine is dislocated, and her chest cavity has collapsed. She was also injected with liquid silver before death." Hearing the report, my father looks so calm that it's just like a case study of no consequence. Neither of them can recognize that the body belongs to me—their daughter and sister!

Three days after I died, my fiancé got a call to ID the body. He just scoffed. "She's dead, so what? Call me when she's in the ground." The cops, out of options, hit up my backup contact—my childhood friend. He actually laughed. "She's really gone? Not my problem. Burn her or whatever." Then my body hit the internet— And suddenly, both of them looked like ghosts.

Ang ampon ng aking ama ay ikinulong lamang sa masikip na storage closet nang halos labinlimang minuto, ngunit tinalian niya ako at itinapon sa loob bilang parusa. Tinakpan pa niya ang ventilation gamit ang mga tuwalya. "Bilang nakatatandang kapatid ni Wendy, kung hindi mo siya kayang alagaan, marapat lamang na maranasan mo rin ang takot na naramdaman niya,” seryoso niyang sabi. Alam niyang may claustrophobia ako, ngunit ang aking mga desperadong pakiusap, ang aking matinding takot, ay sinagot lang ng malupit na sermon. "Magsilbi sana itong aral sayo para maging mabuting kapatid." Nang tuluyang lamunin ng kadiliman ang huling hibla ng liwanag, nakakaawa akong nagpumiglas. Isang linggo ang lumipas bago muling naalala ng aking ama na may anak pa siyang nakakulong at nagpasya siyang tapusin na ang aking parusa. "Sana'y naging magandang aral sa iyo ang isang linggong ito, Jennifer. Kung mangyayari pa ito muli, hindi ka na pwedeng manatili sa bahay na ito." Ngunit kailanman ay hindi niya malalaman na matagal ko nang nalanghap ang aking huling hininga sa nakakasulasok na silid na iyon. Sa kadiliman, unti-unti nang nabubulok ang aking katawan.

A plane crash tore my husband and his twin brother apart. One survived. One did not. When I rushed to the hospital, I saw my brother-in-law, who had just survived the crash, locked in a passionate kiss with his wife. My husband? He lay lifeless in the morgue. Blinded by grief, I stumbled down the stairs…and lost the child I had spent three years longing for. Three years passed. Just as I was finally learning to breathe without him, I overheard a conversation between his closest friend and my brother-in-law: "How long do you plan to keep pretending to be your brother? Alicia is your legal wife." He adjusted his glasses, voice icy and distant. "I swore to my brother I'd protect Emily for the rest of my life. I am him now. As for Alicia… let her be the debt I carry into my next life." That's when I learned the truth. It was the brother-in-law who died in the crash. My husband, the man I had mourned all those years, had taken on his brother's identity to stay by Emily's side, the unattainable woman he had always secretly loved. So then what about me? The woman clinging to old memories, living in torture for three years. What was I to him?