Luke Bernstein. The name echoed through the room, even though Katherine didn't think she'd said it all that loudly. There was weight in that name, or maybe in the surname, and the redhead couldn't help but glance at Lucía, hoping to catch a hint of pain or something more on her face. But instead, she found reminiscence, acceptance, and perhaps a well-hidden flicker of guilt.
"Luke Bernstein was my father. My adoptive father, to be exact," Lucía said, somehow finding the strength to flash her best smile.
"Eh?" Katherine blurted reflexively. She then realized she had probably been staring at Lucía since reading the name, so it made sense that the doubt was plain on her face.
Before Katherine could apologize or find a way to smooth over the awkwardness, Lucía did it for her. "Don't worry. It doesn't hurt the way it used to. And he died doing what he loved. So things could have been worse."
"My sincerest condolences," said Katherine, and although Lucía had heard that phrase a hundred times before, this was perhaps one of the few that didn't bother her. Maybe because it felt genuine, or maybe because those spring-green eyes were just too pretty, it was hard to say.
"Don't worry. And thanks for checking in. Now I have a rough idea of when I'll be ready for the funeral," Lucía replied, looking a little less tense and sorrowful than a few moments before.
A playful smile crept back onto her lips as she added, "Which reminds me, I now have a whole free week with nothing to do. If only I had a new friend to help me kill the boredom."
Even someone as oblivious as Katherine picked up on the hint and replied, "Well, I still have a couple of days of classes and prom, but I'm sure I can keep you company in the afternoons."
Lucía blinked, surprised, a couple of times before the realization hit her. "Oh, right, I almost forgot you're just about to come of age. At least you're nearly free from high school," she said, a tempting idea beginning to stir in the back of her mind.
Katherine was about to respond, the conversation with Lucía was becoming more comfortable by the moment, but before her voice could escape her lips, something else cut through the silence between the two girls.
"It hurts." A single word, drifting in from the ether, carrying a chill and stillness no mortal voice could hold. One could almost feel their lungs freeze over. The heart tightened under an unfamiliar pressure. Except it wasn't unfamiliar, not to Katherine.
"Katherine, I thought you said you were alone," Lucía said with a nervous smile clinging to her lips. Her body was taut as a spring, every muscle tense, her posture spelling out that classic fight-or-flight tension she always defaulted to.
Of course, Katherine couldn't distinguish between that kind of tension and the sheer fear that gripped her now. "This shouldn't be possible, not here," the redhead murmured, unaware she'd spoken aloud.
"It's so cold… and it hurts." The voice echoed again, this time clearer, unmistakably supernatural. Its source: a long hallway that Katherine knew led to the morgue adjacent to the funeral home.
Pure terror climbed her spine as a claw of pain clutched her heart. She knew that voice. It belonged to a childhood friend turned abuser, recently turned corpse. The realization struck like a freight train. Jonathan Blackthorn was dead—but he hadn't left. No, he was here.
Unfortunately, in her distraction, Katherine didn't notice Lucía beginning to walk toward the morgue. "Seems like it's coming from here," Lucía said calmly, pulling a small glass vial from one of her jacket pockets with practiced ease.
"Wait, you shouldn't go in there!" Katherine cried in panic, unable to stop herself as she rushed after Lucía.
"It's fine. Someone might need our help in there," Lucía replied, with an air of confidence so natural it was as if she hadn't noticed the ghostly wailing echoing from within.
Exasperated, frightened, and at her wits' end, Katherine could do nothing but follow. As the two girls neared the morgue, the voice grew more intense, more desperate and frantic, accompanied now and then by the sound of metal striking metal.
Katherine swallowed hard, terrified, unaware that her right hand had instinctively latched onto Lucía's left. Though her mind registered the useless realization that, strictly speaking, only the mortuary home was built on consecrated ground, meaning ghosts could very well roam the morgue, she'd simply been lucky not to encounter one until today.
With perhaps too much nonchalance, Lucía ignored the "Staff Only" sign on the morgue door and opened it without even knocking, to Katherine's complete disbelief and fear.
And yet, to both their surprise, there was no one, nothing waiting inside.
There was nothing but sterile metal tables, impeccably maintained macabre tools, an abundance of hand-washing stations, a couple of refrigerators whose contents Katherine preferred not to think about, and a wall of metal drawers used for storing bodies.
Katherine hadn't felt this relieved in her entire life. She let out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding, completely missing the faint disappointment that flickered across Lucía's face. Unfortunately, good fortune wasn't exactly something that came often in the redhead's life.
Clak. Clak. Clak.
The sound of metal striking metal echoed through the room, its origin obvious in the wild rattling of one of the wall drawers. Swallowing hard, Katherine took a few steps forward, mainly because she was still clinging to Lucía's hand, and the other girl had already approached the drawer.
"Jonathan Blackthorn," Lucía read aloud from the label, her voice thick with intrigue and anticipation.
As if responding to her voice, the movement stopped for a brief moment, just long enough for both girls to relax, before the drawer suddenly shot open, the sliding table beneath it snapping forward to reveal the corpse it held.
Katherine felt her vision blur, her stomach twisting in revolt as it threatened to return the contents of her breakfast. Words failed her. Her legs failed her. And soon, she found herself flat on the cold morgue floor, mind overwhelmed by what she had just seen.
There was Jonathan Blackthorn. Any shadow of life that had once flickered inside him was utterly gone. What remained was a face frozen in pain and sorrow. Pools of putrid darkness had replaced the light and color of his eyes. The body, once a vessel of youthful vitality and strength, was now a grotesque canvas upon which someone, or something, had scrawled massive, jagged wounds.
The gashes resembled ancient tree roots, gnarled, tangled, and in places so deep it seemed a miracle the body was still in one piece. But this was no miracle. It was the handiwork of something far more sinister… and sadistic.
Lucía, for her part, didn't look repulsed or frightened. Instead, a contemplative expression played across her beautiful features. A different kind of intellect gleamed behind her amber eyes, analyzing every detail, piecing together clues, drawing conclusions. Yet all that escaped her lips was a quiet murmur: "Yeah… that punch of mine didn't do this."