creative spark 2020

LOST



in

her


HEART














- Ramida (Opal) Watcharinporn & Sirorat (Nate) Khamwanate -


Seeing black was all 1vk could remember before passing
out. He squinted his eyes, adjusting them to the bright light. The
alien himself knew he was immune to such thing but after the
incident, he wouldn’t want to risk himself. Sighing, he got up but
flopped back down again. The incident rushed through his mind as
he crawled to the nearest source of water he could find. He was
able to tell the place wasn’t his home due to the fact that there were
green things and a peculiar creature with black and white stripes
eating them. Observing carefully, he saw a female human walking
towards that creature, followed by a male human. 1vk, being a
shape-shifting alien, transformed himself into his human form, 6’2”

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man, soft raven hair, chocolaty brown eyes, and narrow nose. He
spent a few days homeless until he learned about shelters and
began gathering everything required to build a house.
“Good afternoon, young man. What would you like to
purchase today?” 1vk’s eyes darted around the shop and pointed
to the lamp. “That brown lamp, please. Thank you.” His deep voice
startled the old lady for a bit as she slowly reached for the lamp.
“You just moved here? I’ve never seen you around.” “Yes, ma’am.
I am new.” She held out her hand, saying, “Very well then, welcome
to Benorpan. I’m Safiya and you are…” “I am not quite sure if you
will be able to pronounce my name.” He shook her hand. “Write it
down. I might be able to read it out loud.”

‘1vk’
The lady’s eyes grew wide followed by a laugh. “Luke!
That’s it, that’s your name.” “Yes, yes, that.” He smiled, handing
the little amount of money he got for her. “No, no, keep it. Take that
as a welcome gift from me.” She grinned widely, handing the
money back to him. “No, no, I cannot take it without paying.”
“Don’t worry dear.” She waved him off and he walked out of the
shop shrugging. The land was given to him by the people there
after learning about him going on a trip but failed to complete it so
he was stuck there. A simple wooden house sat on top of the land
with a painted fence and an area for growing crops. 1vk, now Luke
was extremely happy with what he had and began his career as a
farmer.

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Near Luke’s wooden shelter, there stood an old one-story
house which had been abandoned by its owner, who later returned
to his place after a long journey. After Luke had realized that he
had got a neighbor, he, with his introvert traits, decided to do his
job at night in order to avoid building up a relationship with him.
However, one night, while Luke was occupied with seeding the
new plants he had just bought, a strange four-leg creature with a
fluffy tail barked at him out of nowhere. Trembling with extreme
fear, his long legs started running instantaneously, and the creature
chased him with ferocity. “Jiffy! Stop! Hey, calm down!” A voice
called out, coming from where his neighbor’s house was located.
Luke, exhausted, kneeled down on the ground, trying to catch his
breath. “Hey! Are you okay? I’m sorry for Jiffy.” A tall, tanned
man with a few wrinkles and spots on his face came closer to Luke.
Nodding his face for his answer, Luke trembled on his feet. “Hey!
I never knew you live here. I’m Kaden, by the way, living in the old
house over there,” Luke came into the realization that he was in a
dilemma, for he didn’t want to start conversations with others.
Kaden stood there, his eyes widen, waiting for an answer. “Um..
I-I’m Luke. Nice to meet you and goodnight.” Replied the man
softly. “Nice to meet you.” Before he could even finished, his
peculiar neighbor had already left the scene.

A year and a half had already passed since the day the two
met, they soon started to have a very good and sincere relationship,
not only being neighbors but friends to each other. One night, while
Luke was scribbling down on what he called his ‘journal’, he heard
a loud bang followed by a groan, coming from his neighbor’s

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resident. “Ouch! Shoot!” Luke suddenly stopping writing and ran
out to where the sound came from. As soon as his eyes sensed the
picture of a man trying to stop his blood from bleeding out of a big
wound in his head, without hesitation, he instinctively put his right
hand on the wound. Suddenly, the wound began to heal itself and
in seconds, it disappeared as if nothing had ever happened to
Kaden’s head. Silence took over the two men, one with great
astonishment at the power he had seen from his friend and one
with what he had done. “How did you do that, Luke? I’ve never
seen anything like that before,” Kaden finally destroyed the
awkward silence. “Please, don’t tell anyone about this,” Luke
warned his friend not to reveal his power instead of answering the

question. “Alright, it’s fine. I’m not telling on you, but can you tell
me what just happened?” Hesitated, Luke decided to let his only
friend know about his background, where he was actually from,
why he was living here, and what he had done a moment ago. Luke
had the ability of a healer, capable of healing both interior and
exterior wounds with his right hand. However, he didn’t quite want
to use his special power on other people as he was not the one
who destined people’s fate. Kaden looked up in great astonishment,
instead of fear. This made him feel that he had a true friend in his
life who trusted him with an extremely big secret. However, Luke
was still finding the way back to his planet. All the scribbled
calculations he had been writing down, determining what day
Eormanric, the sun, and the earth would be in alignment again. He
finally came to the conclusion that he would be able to go home in
the next 400 years. He was looking forward to that day coming with

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anticipation, even though his true friend was living his life in
Benorpan.
40 years had flown, and now Kaden entered the end of his
life while Luke still looked almost the same when Kaden had first
met him. On the very last day of his life, Luke had a vow to him that
he would be his friend forever. Incredibly, the vow implemented
itself that when Kaden, in his new soul and body on earth, had his
primary memory, the remembrance of his old pal Luke. The
extraordinary phenomenon had occurred many times until 1984,
when he turned himself to be a philosopher, previously being a
merchant and a servant in the palace. Kaden, in this life, fell in love
with a sterling, delicate woman when they first met at the hospital
where Kaden was working at. A short time later, Kaden had a
marriage ceremony, and Luke was there, looking at the couple and
appreciating their true love. One day in the summer of that year, the
two friends were having vacation time together after hard work all
day and night on their jobs. “Why don’t you find someone for your
lonely life, someone who can be anyone for you, a friend, a wife, or
a family?” Luke let out a heavy sigh and bit his lips in return. “What?
You really should.” Kaden was expecting an answer from his best
friend whose lips parted but nothing was coming out. “You can’t do
this, Luke. At least give me an answer!” “I-I can’t, really. I’m not
capable of such foreign emotion. Organisms like me feel nothing.
This will only hurt others.” Kaden shook his head and looked at his
beautiful wife who was radiating happiness. “She changed me and
I hope someday you will realize the joy true love brings you.”

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“No, no, this can’t be happening.” Luke’s voice was on the
verge of cracking, looking at his fatally ill best friend. “Life is, well,
life. Death will come, Luke. I don’t want to see you miserable no
more.” The old, dry and raspy voice echoed in his ears. “Live your
life. Give love a chance and you won’t regret it.” It makes Luke feels
more and more concerned about his friend’s condition, he visited
and shared his stories from his own diary to him everyday.
Moreover, being with Kaden towards end period of his life makes
him triggered about his own life.
Luke, years later, was still devastated. And his friend,
Kaden was still in a coma. Luke finally mastered his degree in
medicine and became a spectacular doctor. He was considered
admirable amongst residents. The popularity he had gained over
the years never faded. He was the center of attention but he felt
something was missing, something so pure and comforting, love.
Luke knew he couldn’t do it. He began to feel compassion for his
only best friend Kaden, but now that he no longer able to help him
anymore due to his serious illness, there were no shoulders to lean
on. His heart shattered into millions of pieces without healing. He
knew the compassion he felt would fade now or later for once and
for all.

Luke sat there, admiring a portrait of golden flowers, with
Kaden’s words kept popping up in his mind. All of a sudden, he
heard a ruffling noise beside him. He swiftly tilted his head towards
the origin of the noise. “I am so sorry. Didn’t mean to annoy you.”
The girl looked up and Luke could feel his heart beating faster

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looking at the girl with blue hair, brown eyes, narrow nose, plumped
lips and arched brows. She was different, in a good way like he
had never seen before. “Not at all.” The words blurted out of his
mouth, earning a chuckle in return. “Hailey, by the way.” “Oh, um,
Luke.” “Nice to meet you, Luke.” She smiled and he felt a slight
blush creeping up his cheeks.

After work, he walked home with the woman. It made him
think that she became a part of his life, he could not feel the same
walking back home alone without her. “My happiness depends on
her," Luke wrote in his journal. Even though she was considered a
working woman, Luke still thought that she was subtile and cherish.
He wanted to protect her from everything and to heal her on every
occasion possible. A half year passed by until Luke assured with
her. He told this story to Kaden, “I wanted to use my time with
her”. Kaden was happy and appreciated to hear that from his great
friend, he replied “Of course, you can live and spend your life time
as long as you would like to”. However, Luke's facial expression

was not as good as it could be, he said desperately that “My dear
friend, it has been about 400 years I have met you on this star.
I received the signal from the crew of my stars that the alignment
will be on the next two days when the sun rises and they are going
to pick up at my first wooden-house which is located on the
countryside hill. It is time to come back home to me. I am afraid
of leaving her alone”. Kaden never heard a story from his friend
before. “You have to ask yourself what your priority is, and you will
find the true answer”.

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Luke spent a day and realized the strange feeling that he
could feel every time when he was beside Hailey. They were eating
dinner in the basement of Luke’s house. He told her that, “I don’t
know what this feeling is, I only know that I want to protect you,
I want to heal you and I do not want to lose you. Can this feeling
be called love?” Their eyes were contacted for a while,he got
something in his mind. Then, he grabbed his coat, ran out and
drove to the countryside hill.

As soon as he arrived, many crew from his star s were
standing in front of the sun rays and waiting for him to come home.

One of them said, “We came to bring you back to our star, it has
been 4 months we have not seen you. There are many people who
are waiting for you, they all needed the healer like you”. Luke
muted for a while then informed the crew frankly that he does not
want to go home. The crew explains that “If the star loses the
healer who is going to heal us...” Luke told them that “I will give this
power back to the star and find someone else to be the next
healer. I no longer want this power to live on the earth.” There
were five minutes before the alignment end, the head crew said:
“If you think this is the best way we will…”

The next day came shortly after Luke got back to his home,
his lover has prepared breakfast for him. He approached her,
wrapping his arms around her and said “I will be your happiness
and your healer. All the pain and tiredness, I will heal you with my
ordinary human heart and soul”.

Artificial World

- Peerawich (P) Inwong -

Lab Section X, Delta’s countryside

Lab Director Merlin Errol just finished up his new invention
that many generations had tried to create. As he executed his
testing code, a bolt of lightning strikes a car in the lab’s parking lot.

This thing is going to change the whole world.
__________________________________________________________

Adrian Presley embraced the atmosphere of dawn as
picked up a daily local newspaper in front of his house, where its
headline had a bold text describing a groundbreaking technology
they defined as Code of Earth where Earth and its inhabitants were
defined as a string of codes and could be edited and uploaded by
a device called Centurion, which was the device situated in the
safe in its underground vault. As Adrian read, he thought of how far
humanity progresses from having no idea of how natural
phenomena occurred to be the one who can control it. The article

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concluded that Centurion will be used only in the case of extreme
emergency with the order of the government. The article included
the image of Centurion, which is just an ordinary-looking laptop
sitting alone in a gigantic white vault with a blinking USB attached
on its port. After he finished reading, he went out, got dressed and
prepared his work. He lived in Alpha city, which was only half an
hour drive to his work in Beta city. As he was driving his car out of
his garage, the car radio creaked to life and started shouting about
the security measure to guard this precious technology, but the
authorities’ spokesperson said that it isn’t necessary as nobody
except the lab technicians knew the exact location of the vault. The
spokesperson also told that its programming language was a
unique language where only those who had access to it knew. The
security system of trust will never work, Adrian thought as he
pushed the gas and went to work.

An hour later, he reached his office in a majestic skyscraper.
The sign above his head read: Homeland’s Security and Stability
Council. As he reached his work cube, the alarms sounded. That
alarm was meant to be used in an EXTREME case of emergency,
which he had only heard it twice since he worked here. The first
time was 5 years ago when his drunken coworker wandered into
the main control room during lunch break and press that button.
He was immediately fired. The second time is now. His working
cube consists of a computer, a stack of documents and a hologram
portal. Computer screens were useful for coding and hologram
was useful for presentation and visualization. When his computer
screen flashed up to life, the display with bright red background
and bold black text read:

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NATIONAL SECURITY ISSUE
THE POWERFUL DEVICE NAMED, CENTURION, WAS STOLEN
FROM THE LAB. IT CAN AFFECT THE WHOLE WORLD IF
FALLEN INTO THE WRONG HANDS
MISSION: FIND THE DEVICE AND RETRIEVE IT BACK TO THE
VAULT ADDRESS;.....
INFORMATION: DEVICE’S IP: 903.560.62.684 ACCESS
THROUGH MINISTRY OF DEFENSE’S SERVER ONLY. DEVICE IS
CAPABLE OF BOTH ASSASSINATION AND MASS
DESTRUCTION CENTURION'S TRANSLATED ACTIVITY LOG ON
THE DESKTOP UPDATED EVERY 15 SECONDS

Adrian cursed as he read the announcement. His section
was called “Technological and Cyber Stability Control”, where
their work was to gather information and solve cyber crisis, such as
nationwide hacking or governmental server breach. He clicked at
Centurion’s activity log icon on his desktop. Its activity log, written
in white text on black background, appeared. Surprisingly, the
device’s GPS is still on. He keyed the obtained coordinate and
elevation into the map software. The result was shocking. The
hologram portal revealed it was his neighbor’s house. He was
about to request a field team when the coordinate changed.
He keyed it in and it turned out that the location is at the other side
of the world. As the team was grunting and tried to stop this bug,
a dialog appeared on the log. The log read:

\\good morning to people tracking us. our first
attempt will start at 9 o’clock. another clue will be
released after the purge. one of the coordinates is
us. have fun treasure hunting\\.

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Adrian looked at his watch. My God! It was now 8.50 am.
As the team cried in shock and panic, our savior arrived. Here
walked in the masculine man packed in an office outfit, who the
office believed can save the day. It’s Mr. Florentino Turner, the
director of HSSC himself. As everyone in the office knew, Florentino
was the best programmer HSSC had in the reign of the previous
director. Mr. Florentino started briefing about the project when
someone’s watch rang. He looked at his watch and realized that
the time is here. Exactly 9.00 am. He was about to interrupt
Florentino when one of the technicians raised his hand and pointed
to his monitor. Adrian walked back to his computer to see what
happened.

The first purge had started.

An oddly short string of code read:

\detonate(LONDON,0900);
Another string of text popped up


\\nice intro. clue: user initials: F.T. next
purges are 9.30 am. watch out\\.
Adrian alerted everyone to look at the news and told
Florentino to quickly finish briefing. Florentino quickly concluded
and rushed back to his office. He instructed everyone to jot down
every coordinates until it started looping back again and send it to
the field operatives headquarters around the globe. The team
quickly scribbled down sets of numbers and emailed it to
headquarters. As he is jotting down the coordinates, another string
of text pop up

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\\solution_offered: transfer 1 G$ to a bank in
the Cayman Islands trans#:X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X.X before
9.30am for Centurion and world’s sake. waiting\\
Adrian slumped back into his chair as he read. 1 Gigadollars
is 1 billion dollars. This guy is absolutely insane. Bob Stein, Team’s
leader spoke in shock and panic as he called for a brainstorm.
Below his eyes were blood-shot and those eye bags were
noticeable. One of the team members suggested hacking
Centurion as we have their IP address, but Bob quickly denounced
it, because Centurion’s anti hacking software was absolutely hack-
proof as Centurion’s development was still in progress, the hacker,
who had profile of leaving no traces after hacking their Space
Agency, tried hacking it, but failed miserably and got arrested
later. Another suggested reporting it to Mr. Florentino. As Bob is
considering, Adrian noticed the office’s clock read 9.30 am. Adrian
silently moved back to his monitor and look at Centurion’s activity
log. As if it was timed, a string of code and text appeared. This
time, the commands were a bit longer, and more terrifying:

\activate_starburst;
{
\starburst_detonate(Chicago,0930);
\tornadoF5(Chicago,0930)
\starburst_detonate(Florence,0930);
\starburst_detonate(Delhi,0930);
\starburst_detonate(Rio_Dejanero,0930);
\starburst_detonate(Lagos,0930);
\starburst_detonate(Oslo,0930);
\jet_stream(speed_up)
\wait_til(1000);

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\starburst_detonate(Tokyo,1000);
\starburst_detonate(Melbourne,1000);
}
\\may the purge begin. find Centurion to distribute cure\\
\\starburst: default protocol to reduce human’s population
and set up utopia using programmable, now-asymptomatic,
pathogen\\
\\standard proportion of operable and inoperable starburst
is 50:50\\
Adrian sat there dumbfounded. He fetched out his phone
and the first news he found was an article with videos of yellowish
fume spewing up from the city’s sewer and empty areas. The fume
then got blown away. Minutes later, the city was covered by thick
yellow fog. The fog then started to fade away, leaving the city’s air
clear again. He thought this guy was indeed a mad guy. This guy
was also clever as he used tornado and jet stream to spread his
pathogen to other area across the Earth. From a city-destroying
explosives to world-threatening pathogen. As the situation in the
room escalated, Adrian decided to do report it directly to Mr.
Florentino. As Bob was cursing at the code, Adrian sneaked out of
the room and took the elevator up to the top of the building. The
door opened to a large corridor with 2 cozy pots of fern on both
sides. Adrian ran toward Florentino’s private study. Adrian pushed
himself against the door, slamming it open. He expected to see
Florentino sitting at his desk, figuring out ways to stop this maniac,
but the scene inside tranquilized him.
__________________________________________________________

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Sicily, July 9 , 1943
th
Florentino was sitting on his front porch in Sicily when his

neighbor yelled out “The Americans had landed on the beach. This
is the end.”

His drunken father, Luigi, walked out, holding a half-full
bottle of wine in his hand, sit on his favorite chair and said with his
drunken accent “Florentino, listen to me. The war is a filthy thing.
It’s about people attacking other countries and claimed them as
theirs. I lost my father to the evilness of World War One. Before
he went on his final expedition. He asked me to sit down at this
EXACT seat and tell me this “If you grow up, be the world’s leader
and KILL them all. Have no mercy. The world will be purified after
those little sacrifice.” At first, I thought he was pulling my leg, but
as I grow, I agree more and more. Please…. please Florentino, don’t
get involved into this kind of thing later in your life. I used to…”
his father kept speaking as he saw a metallic canister was hurled
into their porch, spewing out white cloudy fumes from both ends.
He didn’t have a chance to tell his father about this as he saw
multicolored rings spinning in his vision as his vision went black.

He woke up in a local hospital. His father was accidentally
shot by a soldier in his head during the siege of Sicily. His father’s
conversation echoed in his head.
__________________________________________________________

Florentino just manipulated Centurion to help this rotten
world. He was admiring his work, as a technician slammed his door
opened. The technician seemed shocked as he saw Centurion
laptop on his desk. His eyes were flooded with tears

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“Why?”, the technician asked.
“To purge this world”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Do you know why the crime rate is rising, more people
getting imprisoned and some penitentiary overflowed?"
“Well, there’s nothing to do with annihilating millions…,
probably billions of population.”

“What I’m trying to do is to reset the population to
...default settings and everybody has an equal right to live.”
“But..”

“By doing this, we have a high possibility to be left with the
equal amount of good people and bad people, which can inhibit the
apocalypse from ourselves for at least a century, just like the
name of this device.”
“What?”

“Centurion is the commander of a century in the ancient
Roman army. This device can guide humanity and the world out of
its man-made inevitable genocide, which will be more violent and
painful, for at least a century.”

“But this is against all kinds of moral for scientists and
researchers.”
“Why does nobody praise me? I do this for the sake of
humanity!”

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“This is unnecessary…”

“I’ve heard enough of this!”
__________________________________________________________
Adrian thought Florentino was out of his mind. He bent
down to Centurion and typed something in.

“I’ve done here on this ignorant world. I ran out of ways to
help this dying world.”, Florentino shouted out, rising up from the
Centurion.

Mr. Florentino’s skin started to glow dim indigo-blue light.
Suddenly, a white bright light shot out of the middle of his body,
cremating him instantly. That, as Adrian saw, was the brightest light
he had ever seen in his life.
When Adrian opened his eyes, Mr. Florentino was gone.
Only a puff of smoke filled the room. He rushed to the laptop sitting
on the desk. He wasn’t prepared for this.

On the screen, it wrote:

\activate_starburst(Florentino_Turner);
\set_timer;
if
timer=0060_sec
{
\activate_starburst(100%);
\shut_down;
}

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Florentino had done it. He had programmed the final code
before he sealed his fate. Adrian had to fix the code before the
code was executed. As he was about to upload the edited code,
he noticed his skin turned blue and he slumped to the floor. It’s too
late now. He used all of his power and dragged himself to the
window. His eyes were flooded with tears as his chest started
radiating the brightest light he had ever seen. He could see white
flash blinking up from all over the city. In his last seconds,
Florentino’s last phrase repeated in his mind “inevitable genocide…”.

The Diaries of the Mirage







- Ninthira (Pam) Jarupanich -

The girl was absorbed by the book she was reading. Slowly,
she flipped one page to another. Her hair was tied up in a ponytail-
high and sleek. The warm and yellowish light from the chandelier
above made her already blonde hair looks as if it was made from a
melting gold. They matched perfectly with the aesthetic of the room
and the whole house. It was a three-story house in the middle of 8
acres land. It was the sort of house that you never seem to come to
the end of. Each room was filled with luxurious furniture and
decorations, collected by the ancestors of the family. Along the
corridor wall were the pictures of their ancestors and a suit of armor
at the end of each corridor. There was even an art and musical
instruments gallery in the house. All of this did not interest Daisy as
much as the library does. Reading books helps Daisy get the
feeling of loneliness off her mind and on to an adventure; some
bizarre, some hazardous and some glorious; she loves them all.

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She never had a friend as she never has to go to school. Every day,
she would study and read books at home. Her only friend was her
sister but she left her. She never knew where she went but she
never saw them again after one night.

It was getting dark. Daisy closed her book and ran her
fingers over her eyes. She stood up, then walked to her bedroom.
Daisy was welcomed by the warm yellowish light from the
chandelier, left turned on by the maid. The room is creamy-white
with white furniture contrast with pinkish-red decorations.
A beautiful mural is attached on the wall above the bed frame,
hand-painted by an anonymous artist. The scene is of villagers
walking down the street in the winter festival. She walked past the
bed and to the bathroom. She looked at the reflection of herself in
the mirror and untied her hair. The voluminous champagne curls
cascade over her white shoulders. She undressed and stepped
into the shower.
After she finished, she wore her favorite pink silk nightgown
and head to the bedroom. The cold air from the bedroom brushes
against her skin, making her shivered for that her skin was still
warm from the hot shower she took. Daisy walked to the vanity to
get her hairbrush and slowly, she ran the hairbrush on her soft hair.
Her feet were numb from the coldness of the floor. She turned off
the chandelier and nightstand lamps and went to bed. Tiredly, she
drifted to sleep.

Daisy woke up to the thud sound from the next room,
knowing it was her maid for that her parents left early for work. She
sat up, yawned and stretched her arm, and with her eyelids still

119



heavy, she headed to the dining room. From the hallway, the smell
of frying butter reached Daisy’s nostrils and filled her brain with
mouthwatering images of fluffy, warm goodness. Knowing what it
was, she bolted into the dining room and there it was- a hot, power-
sugared, blueberry flecked pancakes on a plate. Butter slides
slowly down the pancakes, leaving a yellow trail behind it. Warm
maple syrup is drizzled on them, covering them in a brown, thick
and sweet blanket. As quickly as lighting, Daisy finished her plate.

Daisy followed her usual morning routine. After she was
done, she decided to relax on the window seat in her room. Some
time had passed and Daisy found herself staring at the beautiful
garden outside the window. Her mind was full of memories of her,
her mom and sister. Every weekend during spring, her mom would
take her and her sister out to take a walk in the backyard where
they would plant flowers. They always felt satisfied watching their
little plant grow day by day. After months, one would grow into tiny
bloat floating in the green sea, dancing along with the soft breeze,
white petals surrounding its sunny core. Another would become a
round blood-drops. It’s petals stand out in the grass with the long,
thorny stem as fragile as glass.

For today, Daisy decided to take a walk down her memory
lane. She put on her cardigan, grabbed a book by the nightstands
and went out the back door to the backyard.

The air was filled with nostalgia. Each breeze carries the
sweet, old-fashioned aroma of roses with a mild earthy aroma of
daisies- the smell of her childhood spring. For every direction she
turned to, little scenes of her, her mom and sister played in her

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head. She walked along the path across the garden, each step
taking in all the nostalgic memories. In the middle lay a white
bench, surrounded by a huge white cage, rose vines creeping on
it. To the right of her was a statue of a Pegasus- antique and finely
carved.

Daisy sat on the bench and slowly turned the page of her
book over to where she left off. Surrounded by the peaceful
atmosphere and the sharp scent of rose, she lost track of time.
Suddenly, she heard a voice, as soft as a cloud and as delicate as
a flower- the one that she would fall for and obey everything it told
her to do. The voice came from the statue, now on her left. Daisy
followed the voice and stood in front of the statue. The voice came
ringing in her head once again telling her to pet the Pegasus. She
did so then she heard a click sound. The Pegasus’ mouth opened
then a small box slipped out. She opened the box and there was a
small key inside, the one that is not wouldn’t fit the normal size door
keyhole. She kept the key inside her cardigan’s pocket and went
back to reading. The next time she looked up, was when she heard
a faint calling of her maid. She couldn’t make out what she said but
she knew it was for that dinner was ready.

Daisy sat down at the dinner table. She lived with her mother
and father, yet the dinner table was so big and it only made her feel
even more lonely. Daisy finished her dinner, went back to her room
and did her night routine.

It was only seven p.m. but Daisy already felt tired. She put
her book on the nightstand before clambering into bed. As her
consciousness ebbed, her mind swirled into a new dream.

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In the middle of the night, her grandiose dream was interrupted by
the familiar soft sound. Slowly, her dream faded away and there
came the reality. Daisy stared at the ceiling, feeling confused and
lost. She did not know where the voice came from and why would
it call out for her. As she was about to shut her eyes again, thud.
CLINK. Clink. clink. The sound of metal bouncing from the coat
stand echoed throughout the whole room. In less than a split
second, Daisy swung herself off the bed. In the darkness, she
could see a silhouette of a small object on the floor. She squinted
and now that her eyes were adjusted to the darkness, she could
make out a shape of a key. Feared, she tiptoed to the coat stand
and quickly grabbed the key. She was frightened to see that the
key was indeed the one that she kept from the Pegasus statue
earlier. Then the soft voice whispered to her

“Come to the library” and ended with a small giggle.
Now, the voice was no longer sweet and innocent, it was full
of evilness and bitterness. Suddenly, her legs started moving on
their own. She couldn’t feel her legs. They were numb. In less than
a minute, she found herself standing in front of the library door.
Slowly and with fear, she peeked inside the room.
“H-h-hello” she called out.

No one replied. Daisy was about to step back, then,
something pushed her inside the room and the door behind her
shut closed. The voice began to whisper again.
“Over here~”

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Daisy moved toward the right, where the voice came from.
She kept repeating herself to stop but each time the voice
whispered, the more she couldn’t control herself. Daisy stopped
walking as the voice stopped at the furthest right book aisle.

“Down here” continued the voice.

Daisy crouched down and there was a small door; the one
that would perfectly fit a leprechaun. With trembling hands, Daisy
inserted the key and turned it to the right. Click. The wind from the
other side of the door pushed the door open. Some dust and sand
flew with the wind, into the room. The creaking noise the door left
behind sent chills down her spine. With the little moonlight shining
into the library window, she could see it was a tunnel. Stumbling
with fear, she stepped in and the door swung shut. She shrieked.
Fear and darkness covered four of her senses- sight, hearing,
smell, and taste. She could only feel the warm and gritty feeling on
her feet. Hesitantly, she started to move her legs. One step she
went and the faint light starts to light up the whole tunnel. As it grew
brighter, Daisy could see where the light was coming from. Different
shades of purple crystal lit up the tunnel. Daisy was stunned by
how magical the tunnel was.
“Magenta, lilac, orchid, plum, violet,…” spoke Daisy to
herself upon seeing each shade of the crystals.

On the other end of the tunnel, a small light was getting
bigger as she kept walking. Daisy lost track of how far she had
walked from watching all the crystals’ light lit up then dimmed
down- like the breathing of a sleeping baby.

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A cloud of fairy dust, carried along with the fresh breeze of
the waterfall brushes against her skin, making her flinched and
turned to the front of her. There was grassland with ponds and
rainbows. Flowers and grasses wavered and swayed to the
waterfall breeze. To her right, A curtain of white water cascaded
down a series of rocky outcrops. The tiny droplets of water were
like tiny diamonds flowing down with the flow of the waterfall and
into a stream of tiny glitters. Flower fairies, working like a factory,
were feeding droplets to the flowers and protecting them. One
would scoop a drop of water from the waterfall and place them on
the moving rail, covered by leaves, then the other would carry
those droplets to the flowers and feed them. Suddenly, something
shifted at the bottom of the waterfall. There it was, a Pegasus- large
and majestic with expressive eyes, long ears and a beautiful, silky
coat of fur that shines a metallic white. In the middle of the grassland
laid a huge white cage with a bench in the middle, just like the one
she has at home.
Daisy walked down the stone path. Flowers of different
shades surrounded her. She sat on the bench and took in the fresh
air she hasn’t felt in years. She could feel the cool mist from the
waterfall on her skin. Besides her was a small round table with a
book on top. The book cover has nothing written on it, only a symbol
of Pegasus was in the middle. Daisy picked the book up and
opened the book. The first page was a drawing of a young girl
smiling, in the middle of a flower field which seems to be the one in
front of Daisy. The second page started off with “Dear diary…”
which she assumed the book was written by a girl from the
handwriting and drawing. Daisy spent the next hours reading every

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single word and page of the book. She closed the diary, stretched
her arms out and yawned. She didn’t know that she would be so
absorbed in reading a girl’s diary as much as she was right at the
moment. Daisy knew that the time was running out and she has to
be home before someone found out that she was missing. She took
the same path back to her room.

On her bed, Daisy stared blankly at the ceiling, feeling that
everything that happened was just one of her realistic wild dreams.
Fresh scenes of the girl’s diary were still running through her mind.
She did not expect the girl’s happy start to become horrifying
towards the end. She has a tickle something dreadful happened
before the girl could finish the book. She brushed those negative
thoughts out of her mind and after some time she could feel her
eyelids getting heavier. Before she could shut her eyes and rest,
the delicate morning light touched her skin through the sheer
curtains of her bedroom. Daisy knew she would have to wake up
any minute and continue her day so she got up and followed the
same routine of heading downstairs for breakfast, get ready for the
day, read books and study in the library, have lunch then continue
studying or reading, have dinner and get ready for bed.

There was some time during the day that Daisy felt dizzy
and worn out because she didn’t get enough sleep last night.
Tonight, Daisy planned on not going to ‘the mirage’-she called it.
In the middle of the night, she woke up to the same sound then she
found herself in front of the garden field. She was drained but the
only thought of reading a book among the waterfall breeze and
dancing flowers and fairies kept her going. She walked down the

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path to the bench. Everything was the same but she noticed the
book on the side table has changed. It was a new diary. Again,
Daisy spent the next hours reading every single lines and page.
When she was back in her room, it was morning again and she
could not get some sleep. Then she would do the same thing as
yesterday.

Everything Daisy did in the past two days became her
routine for the next few months. The only thing that changed was
the book on the table beside the bench. Every diary started off with
contentment and became horrendous towards the end and
surprisingly, none of them finished the book.

One day, she came across a very familiar handwriting
diary. In the book, the girl wrote about her deep thoughts and had
mentioned about her sister. Daisy was surprised by how similar her
stories were to her but like always, the ending was tragic. The next
day, she received a blank book. On the table lay a pen for her to
write with. She grabbed the pen then her imagination ran wild. She
wrote about everything she did on that day and her thoughts on
everything. Quickly, the page was filled with Daisy’s drawings and
writings.
Several months had passed since the first day Daisy went
into the mirage and she still hadn't slept. She was fatigued and got
badly ill. Daisy realized that the diaries she read weren’t any
different from her life. She could not stop herself from going there
at night. She tried burying and throwing the key down the river but
eventually, the key ended up in her bedroom every night.

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Today, she had the feeling that it would be her last day.
The night time came and she was in front of the small door in the
library. With trembling hands, neither from fear nor nervousness
but from weakness, she unlocked the door. Clink. The sound of the
wind whistled and the door flew open. Stumbling, she walked
through the tunnel with her hand gripped onto the tunnel’s wall.
It was only halfway when her legs started shaking. With tighter and
stronger clutch to the wall, Daisy continued walking. Just before
she could reach the grassland, she fell on her knees. She could no
longer stand on her feet. Her heart was quivering, her head was
spinning and her body was as hot as molten lead yet she felt as
cold as ice. Abruptly, she couldn’t breathe. Daisy laid there, her
body and cheeks on the Earth's ground, the only place that made
her feel warm. Each breath became shorter. Soon, the picture of
the beautiful magical land she had dreamt of since she was young,
turned into a living hell, ice cold. The blue sky turned into the
cloudless grey sky. The clear ponds became pools of souls.
The rainbows became smokes and fogs. Flowers and fairies
became ashes. The waterfall froze and Pegasuses’ skin became
so thin that every bone was shown through. Daisy took in her last
breath. Her tears flowed down her pale cheeks and onto the Earth.
Images turned black. The answers became clear. It was too late.

- Napat (Pat) Chutijirawong & Parintara (Kat) Wongsrisoontorn -


The dim room seemed to be empty except for him. That
was the first thing Eric thought when he opened his eyes. But then
he turned to his left and saw, to his great relief, that his sister, Ella,
was also there but still asleep. His sister was the only one who
really mattered to him. They were orphaned twins, who were
adopted when they were ten years old. His life didn’t become so
much better. His new parents didn’t love him, but at least he still
had Ella. After a while, he averted his gaze from his sister and
started examining the room that he was in. It seemed like a small
bar. There were only counter seats, and there was no one in the bar
except for his sister and himself. He was about to stand up when
his sister made a small noise and woke up.

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Ella looked around calmly, as usual, but her brows furrowed
in curiosity. Ella wondered out loud, “What is this place?”. Eric
turned to Ella and said, “I don’t know. I can’t remember anything
that happened before this. The last thing I remember is that
I was studying, and then it was just a complete blank”. Ella tried to
recall what happened, but couldn’t either. “Me too”, she said.
In silent agreement, they stood up and started to walk around the
bar, until they saw the bartender. Ella quickly walked up to him and
asked, “Excuse me, can you tell us where we are?”. The bartender
answered calmly, “I can’t, but now that you’re awake, you will have
to play a game. It is the only way for you to get out of here.”
Eric and Ella looked at each other and the fear on their faces

mirrored each other. Ella, being the logical one, asked, “What kind
of game?”. The bartender took out a board game. It was very similar
to the snake and ladder game that they used to play when they
were little, except there were no snakes. Instead, some of the
boxes were colored differently, and has a little card symbol on
them. Before Eric could ask what it is, the bartender answered,
“Each of you will roll the dice and move according to the number
you get. If you land on one of the colored boxes, you will get to
pick up a card, which will have an instruction on it.” Eric looked at

the bartender incredulously, and said, “Are you serious? Do you
really expect us to play games right now? We don’t have any idea
where we are, and we can’t even remember what happened.”
Ella nodded and told Eric, “Let’s just go. We’ll find a way out
ourselves”.

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However, as they started walking away, the wall closed in
around them. Ella and Eric screamed and were forced to run back
to the bartender. The bartender said without any emotion, “As you
can see, there is no way out unless you agree to play the game”.
Ella quickly considered their options: they could try to escape from
wherever they were, but as she looked around again, she saw that
there was clearly no way out. Another option, obviously, is to play
the game, which seemed harmless enough, and maybe this
bartender, whoever he is, will let them out. Ella took a look at Eric
and judging from his grim expression, he was probably thinking
the same thing. So she told the bartender, “Okay, we’ll play your
game”. The bartender nodded and said, “Great decision”, and
added, “Not that you have any”. Then Ella felt like the world was
spinning. After what felt like an eternity, she landed on a hard
surface.

Ella looked around frantically, and was relieved to see that
Eric was next to her. She felt a sense of déjà vu as she looked
around the unknown room again, only to find that they were no
longer in the bar. There were lines drawn on the ground, and she
soon realized that they connected to form small boxes. She looked
down, and she saw that she was currently standing on one with
Eric. The boxes seem to form a passage, and apart from the boxes,
it was an empty, bottomless pit. Another minute of observation
made her realize that they had somehow been sent into the board
game that they agreed to play. Eric seemed to realize the same
thing and he was about to open his mouth to speak when the sound

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of the bartender’s voice reached their ears. It said, “You are now
participating in the game in which both your lives are at stake.
The person who reaches the end first will win. The dice is on your
right. You may roll the dice when you are ready to start the game.
However, please note that the game must be finished within an
hour, or you will be punished”.
The silence that followed seemed to last forever. None of
them moved. Both are shocked and petrified. Finally, Eric broke
the silence and said, “He is kidding, right?”. Eric tried to find an
exit, but as he stepped out of their box, he felt pain shot through
him and screamed. Ella quickly went to him and asked if he was
okay. Eric answered, “I’m fine now”. The realization soon dawned
on them that this, whatever this was, was real. And they could feel
actual pain, which did nothing to calm their nerves. Eric started to
breathe very fast and the fear showed clearly on his face. Ella was
also scared, but hide it well. She hugged Eric and said, “It is going
to be okay. We just have to win this together.” Eric relaxed in his
sister’s embrace, and felt a little better. At least they still had each
other. Ella gave the dice to Eric, and after taking a deep breath, he
rolled it. The dice stopped and the side displaying one dot was
faced up. Eric stared at it, trying to not be disappointed, as he
walked to the closest box. The Ella rolled the dice and got four. She
walked to the box, and found out that it was a box with the card
symbol on it. As she stepped on the box, a card appeared in front
of her. She picked it up and it said: “Plus three boxes (can be used
for yourself or your opponent)”. She thought for a while, and
decided that her brother needed it if they were going to get a tie

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and survive this together. Smiling, Ella said to Eric, “Here, take it”.
Eric saw the card and felt very grateful. He received it and said,
“Thank you”, then moved up to stand next to his sister.
They continued playing for a while until Ella got on another
box with the card symbol. She picked up the card again and it
said: “Tell a secret”. It was unexpected and she took some time,
deciding on what secret to tell, and then spoke up softly, “I used to
date your best friend, Nick”. Eric stared at her with wide eyes.
He opened his mouth, then closed it again. He was not sure if he
should feel happy or angry, so he just answered, “Okay”. Ella was
a little surprised by his answer, but also glad. To make sure, she
asked, “You’re really okay?”. Eric shrugged and found that he was
fine with it, though a little annoyed that she didn’t tell him earlier.
Ella decided that it was good enough that Eric wasn’t angry at her,
so they continued the game.
As they played, Ella got more and more ahead of Eric. Eric
looked down the dark, empty space below him, and started to feel
hopeless. Then it was his turn again. He got on one of the boxes
with the card, and the card said: “Go back to the starting point
(can be used for yourself or your opponent)”. He considered this
for a while, and came to a conclusion. He said, “I’m sorry”, and
handed his sister the card. A part of him told him that this was
wrong, but he comforted himself that his sister was too ahead of
him and they did agree to finish the game together. Ella received
the card, and was shocked that her brother would do this to her,
but she looked on the bright side that Eric was really too behind in
the game, so this had to be done if they were going to finish

132



together. Plus, Eric did have a reason to be angry with her because
of her secret. Ella moved back to the starting point, and they
continued the game.
Not long after that, Eric moved to a box with a card again.
It said: “Tell the worst thing you have ever done”. A big secret that
Eric kept from his sister quickly came to his mind, but he decided
to tell her something else. He said, “Remember that time when you
asked me who ate the cookies, and I said I don’t know? I actually
ate it.” However, as soon as he finished his story, a pain shot
through him. He screamed out loud, and from somewhere, the

sound of the bartender’s voice echoed through the room, “Please
follow the instructions”. Eric replied, “Okay, okay!”, and the pain
disappeared. Eric took a minute to calm down, and started his
story, “I sold your necklace. I really needed the money to buy a
ticket to see the big basketball match. It was a one-time
opportunity, and I couldn’t let it pass. I know how important the
necklace is to you, and I am very, truly, sorry”. Tears started to roll
down his cheek, and he looked down at his feet, not daring to meet
his sister’s eyes. Ella couldn’t believe what she just heard. Unable
to contain her anger, Ella started shouting at Eric, “Do you have any
idea what you did? That necklace was a gift from Nick. It was very
expensive, and I took very good care of it. It was the reason why
we broke up. He thought I sold it to someone because he saw a
woman wearing it. I tried to tell him that I didn’t sell it, that I lost
it, but he didn’t believe me”. Ella cried and said through her tears,
“I love Nick. I really love him. How could you?” Eric felt even more

guilty and tried desperately to comfort her by saying, “I’m so sorry.
I’m sure you’ll find someone else that is even better than Nick.

133


Nick isn’t that good anyway”. Unfortunately, Ella took it the wrong
way, and her anger doubled, “How can you say that about your
friend? Your best friend, for that matter”.

They were silent now, except for Ella’s sobs. Ella picked up
the dice and rolled it. She moved to another box with a card. It said:

“You can get Nick to be your boyfriend again, but in exchange,
there will be a punishment for your brother. Do you accept the
offer?”. In her anger toward her brother, Ella agreed to the offer.
Suddenly, Eric felt an invisible hand squeezing his right arm.
He yelled out loudly for help, but the hand kept squeezing until he
could feel his bone broke. Finally, the hand left, but he still felt the
pain and the blinding rage toward his sister. His fury sprang to life

as he cried out, “Why did you do this? I didn’t hurt you this much.
How could you do this to your own brother?” Then, as if realizing
something, Eric became even more angry. He shouted, “Do you
realize what you did? Basketball was my dream, and now I might
not get to play it anymore because of this”. Eric kept crying bitterly.
After a while, he said, “Everything was easy for you. Our parents
love only you. I have no idea why they even decided to adopt me.
They always ignored me. The only way for me to have any future is
to be a great basketball player. And now, you’ve ruined that too”.
Ella felt very guilty for hurting her brother, but now she started to get
angry again and said, “Nothing was easy for me. I had to work
very hard to get to where I am. As for our parents, I was the one
who convinced them to also adopt you, not just me, because you
were my brother and I thought we should stick together”. Eric
yelled at her, “I didn’t want to be in this family. I didn’t ask you to
do it, did I? I’ve never told you that I want to be adopted. You

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don’t know what it’s like to always live in your shadow”. Ella angrily
responded, “Well, you don’t know what it’s like to have such a
disappointing brother. A brother who would steal from his sister
just to get a stupid ticket”. Eric’s anger spiked, and he shouted,

“Basketball isn’t stupid! You wouldn’t understand. You could have
just gotten the money from our parents, but I couldn’t”. Ella
shouted too, “Well, at least I…”. A sound interrupted their
argument, saying, “Only seven minutes left”.

Ella and Eric looked at each other, then upon realizing that
they were still in the game, were forced to continue playing. Ella
rolled the dice and moved four boxes, so that now she was only
two boxes away from the finish line. Eric started to panic as Ella
turned to smirked at him. It was clear now that their goals had
changed. Now, all they cared about was winning, and they would
do anything to get it. Eric prayed silently as he rolled the dice.
He needed a six in order to win. The dice stopped and the side
faced up was five. Eric swore loudly as he moved five boxes. Ella
is two boxes from the finish line, and Eric is one box. However,
it was Ella’s turn. “It’s over”, said Ella as she rolled the dice. Four
eyes stared at the dice as it rolled over and over until it stopped,
with the one-side facing upward. For a second, it was complete
silence. Then Ella screamed like she had never screamed before.
Her mouth spitting vile curses and without thinking, started shoving
her brother toward the pit, yelling, “I am supposed to win! I am
supposed to live, not you. Everything in your life was made possible
because of me, and you are not even grateful for it”. Eric pushed

back, and shouted, “How many times do I have to tell you? I didn’t

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want to be in this family! I have nothing to be grateful for”. They
were still shoving each other madly, when a timer somewhere went
off. Then they had a familiar feeling of the world spinning, and after
a while, they landed on a surface.

Eric quickly looked around and found out that they were
back in the bar, with the bartender standing before them. Eric
turned to Ella, his eyes flashing dangerously, and yelled, “I was
going to win! I was just one move from the finish line”. Rage
overtook Eric. He ran toward Ella and was about to punch her when
the bartender shouted fiercely, “Stop!”. Shocked by the loud noise,
Eric turned to look at the bartender. The bartender, back to his
calm self, told Ella and Eric, “You are both already dead”.

Instantly, Eric’s memory flooded back to him. He was
walking down the streets after school, his sister by his side. They
crossed the road, still talking happily about something when a car
sped down the street and hit them. The last thing he saw was Ella’s
bright smile. Another moment of silence had passed. Eric was still
processing what he just remembered, and was too overwhelmed
to move. He turned to look at Ella, who seemed as shocked as he
was. Before either of them could ask, the bartender said, “Both of
you are standing on the line between life and death. This was a
test to see which one of you deserves to live and which one
deserves to die. So now, without further ado, I would like to
announce the result of our test. The person who will be rejoining
the land of the living is…”

Sound of Silence















- Pomai (Pomai) Pothinamthong & Dayada (Dada) Pujchathum -


It is 6.30 a.m. and Mrs.Danville is running along the beach
of Mysternia as she always does. She then feels that there is
something strange under her feet that she could not imagine of it.
She screams with shock and fear. What she sees is the white sand
that is now turns to red, the face of a young girl. She has dark hair
and her brown eyes are opening wide, her skin is pale and her
body is underneath the sand. It seems like her last breath has gone
away.
In the OIS office department, a middle aged man is sitting
on his desk drinking a cup of coffee, later then someone walks into
the room.

“Jayden, new case this morning,” Luciano, the one who just
walks in the room, says.
“Who’s taking care of it?” asks Jayden.

“Probably our team.”

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“Oh, well…” says Jayden “any details about the case?”
“Actually this is an interesting one, there’s three previous

bodies that were killed. They are similar to this one, the victim’s
body was covered with a piece of cloth and their mouths were
sewn and stitched together. The police thought that this might be
a serial killer, so they want us to come and join them.”
“The first victim was found a week ago. Her name was

Veronica Lee, a 23-year-old office worker. Her body was covered
with a cloth and her mouth was sewn. The body was found in the
morning near the beach in the west of the island. The second
victim was found 3 days ago, also covered with cloth and sewn
mouth near the beach in the south of the island. His name was
Lowell Jones, a 24-year-old chemist. The last victim, Helen Myers,
was found on the east side of the beach. She was a 22-year-old
waitress and her body was also covered with the cloth and sewn
mouth,” says Tadeo, the man who is coming into the room.

“What about today’s victim, Tadeo?” asks Jayden.
“The fourth victim is a college student, Ashley Wells and

she’s 21. She was found in the north side of the beach.”
“Where are all the bodies now?” asks Jayden.

“The police is sending them to us, probably with Sharon
now” Luciano answer his question.

“Alright, tell her to send me the result,” says Jayden “and
where is Victoria?”
“She is coming” says Tadeo.

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“Tell her to meet me at the crime scene, you stay here and
help Sharon out,” says Jayden.
After he orders Tadeo to help doctor Sharon at the office to
examine the death bodies he and Luciano walks out of the room in
a hurry to get to the crime scene as soon as possible.

As they arrive at the crime scene, Victoria has just arrived
and waited for them. So, Jayden tells Luciano and Victoria to
investigate the crime scene while he is talking to the chief police
officer. However, they did not get any evidence about the murderer
since the floor is covered with sand so that the footprints can be
easily erased and many people have already walked along the
beach. So, the only thing they can do is to collect a sample of the
sand near the place where the body has been found and take a
picture of it.
“Hey, Luciano,” Victoria calls him. “Look at this!”

“What is this? It seems like a tyre print from the car.”
“Probably,” says Victoria.

“Can you collect the sand here, and I will take a photo of
them.”
After that, Jayden decides to goes back to the office to see
what Sharon and Tadeo gets from the bodies and tells Victoria to
collect the data of all the victims, especially about what they do and
where were they before they were killed.

When they arrive at the office, Jayden walks into his room
seeing Sharon sitting at his desk like she is waiting for him.

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“To be honest, I didn’t expect that you will come up here,”
says Jayden.
“Well, I’m willing to come up here, but not in your room,”
says Sharon “how can it be this messy?”

“Just ignore them, tell me what you’ve got. By the way,
where is Tadeo?” says Jayden.
“I’ve told him to check the fingerprints on the victims’
clothes.”

“Alright, so let’s talk about our business. Is there anything
strange about the bodies?” asks Jayden.
“Probably, like the way he or she killed the victims is quite
weird.”

“How?”
“The victims were stabbed in their neck and then their
mouths were sewn with thread, the simple one that we use them
for sewing our clothes and the tyre print found at the crime scene
is from a taxi.”
“I think we are dealing with a taxi killer.” says Jayden in a
scary voice.

“Oh! I forget to tell Tadeo to check for DNA on the
thread.” cries Sharon, after she notices that she forgets to tell him
to check for DNA. So, she asks Luciano to do that for her.
“Alright, so this is the way the killer kills the victims. Am I
right?” asks Jayden.

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“Yes, but other strange thing is that I’ve found anaesthetic
in their blood, but all the victims died with their eyes open wide.”

“Maybe the killer is waiting for them to be awake and then
kill them.”

“That’s probably what I think, but I don’t understand why
the killer needs to do like this.”

“That’s our job to find out,” says Jayden.
A few moments later Tadeo and Luciano come into the
room to tell the results to Jayden. What Tadeo says is that there is
no fingerprint of other people on those fabric. However, Luciano
gets the DNA of the from the threads but we are still unable to tell
who it is. Later then Victoria gets the information about the victims
that all of them use Taxi to go home on the day they stay late at their
workplace.

“Actually the cctv was able to capture the picture of the
car and the license plate, but it’s fake,” says Victoria in a bad
mood.

“It usually be that way, most of the killer, if they use a car,
they probably do like this,” says Jayden.
“Is there anything we can do with this,” asks Luciano.

“Tadeo, tell the MNPD (Mysternia Police Department) to
track that car,” ordered Jayden.
“Is the license plate fake, isn’t it?” asks Tadeo.

141



“Yes, but we can track the car from the CCTV, and let’s see
where this car is going.”
A day after

“Jayden! The DNA test is out,” says Luciano.
“From where?” ask Jayden in a confusion.

“The threads that the killer used to sew the victims’
mouths.”
“Who’s that then?”

“Donovan Chan, he’s 28 years old Hong Kong businessman
who owns a private company at Quindewale.”

“Are you sure? He’s a businessman and our suspect is taxi
driver.”
“Yes, I’ve asked his secretary and she says that her boss
is bored and tries to be a taxi driver.”
“Seriously?” asks Jayden.

“Am I look like I’m kidding?” asks Luciano.

“Alright, let’s go talk to him,” says Jayden.
The team gathers to a tenth-floor of a tall building and goes
straight to Mr. Donovan’s office.

“Mr. Donovan, where were you yesterday morning?” asks
Jayden.

“That’s none of your business,” yells Donovan.

142



“We found your DNA in the thread that we found on the
victim’s body, how will you explain that?” asks Tadeo.
“How did it get there? Yesterday I pierced my finger and
the thread was filled with my blood and then I threw it away.
Maybe someone got it and put on your victim.” explains
Mr. Donovan
“It seems like a weird excuse, anyway, stay in the town,
alright?” says Jayden.

8.30 p.m.

“Sharon, how did you get to the office this morning?”
Luciano asks her.

“My boyfriend drive me here, but I’ll take a taxi home”
says Sharon.
“Are you sure?” asks Luciano “I can drive you home if you

want.”
“No thanks, I’m fine”

“Take care of yourself. By the way, see you tomorrow.”
8.50 p.m.

“Hey! Sharon called me, she’s asking for help!” yelled
Victoria.

“What happen to her?” asks Tadeo.

“She says that the taxi driver is driving her home might be
our taxi killer, she says there’s something strange about him.”

143



“Oh, god tell me this is just a dream!” says Luciano.
“Victoria tracks her location from her cell phone,” says

Jayden. “We will help her and also arrest the killer.”
“Copy that," says Victoria and she runs out of the room.
“Tadeo tells the MNPD to come and help us now.”

“Copy that sir,” says Tadeo.

For the next few minutes, the siren of the MNPD is coming
toward the office, and the chief police is running in the office after
he has received a call from Tadeo.

“Jayden! I've got her location now, the taxi is taking her to
the parliament!” yells Victoria, rushing into the room.
“It must be the parliament, I look at the location of the

previous four places that we found the four bodies, they are all in
each direction of the beach, which is west, south, east, and north
respectively. Every spot leads to the center of the city, which is
the parliament,” explains Luciano.

“Alright, let's go now," says Jayden. “We need to save
her!”
9.15 p.m.
The police and the investigation team arrives at the
parliament. They see the taxi, with that same fake license plate,
parking in front of the parliament. Jayden walks to the car and
touches the front of it and finds out that it is still warm.

144



“They’ve just arrived here,” says Jayden.
“We need to hurry up now,” says Garry, the chief police
officer.

Then they carefully get into the parliament and start
searching for Sharon.
9.25 p.m.

They are standing in front of the conference room and
about to open the door.
“I hope she's in there,” says Luciano.

Then Garry opens the door and holds his gun toward. They
find a body inside the room, and it's Sharon. Her body's laying on
the stage without consciousness. When Jayden sees that,
he quickly runs up to her.

“She's still alive!” yells Jayden.

“So, where is the killer then?” asks Tadeo.
“We need to find him,” says Jayden.

“I'll take her to the hospital, so you guys can continue
searching for the killer,” says Victoria.
“I will send the police officer with you,” says Garry.

After Victoria takes Sharon to the hospital, the rest is looking
for the killer and Garry sends the police to stay at the exit so that the
killer can't get out of the parliament.

145



10.10 p.m.
They find a room with the lights turn on, so they open the
door and see the knife, needle and threads laying on the table.

“The equipment?” says Tadeo.
“But where is the killer,” says Luciano.

While everyone is wondering and looking around the room.
A man who is standing at the back of the room suddenly attacks
Tadeo at his back and runs out of the room.
“Catch him!” shouts Garry.

After the killer try to escape from the arrest. He finds out that
there's no any exit for him since the police are at every exit. So,
he decides to stop and sitting on the stage in the conference room.
“It’s been three years that my daughter was killed. I cry

and think of her everyday. The police try to find the killer over
years and then they found one. At the court, his lawyer defended
him and I just had no rights to speak. No one listens to me and can
you think of what would happen next? He wasn’t arrested and
went home. And my daughter still didn't receive any justice.”
“That’s sad right? And imagine staying with these injustice
for three years. And my daughter, she is the only thing I have!
And look what the government does with her death. Look what
this country have done with us! No one responsible for our lost!”
“Hey Mr., I know you are depressed with that, but you
can’t kill other innocents,” says Tadeo.

146



“Who cares!” yells the killer “What about my daughter?
No one cares about her!”
“But Mr., what you are doing right now is illegal and you will
be convicted,” says Luciano.

“Oh yes, you need to arrest me right?” says the killer in a
calm voice. “But sorry, I won’t let you do that”
After he finishes his word, he pulls out a knife and
immediately stabs it to his neck. Everyone is in shock, no one thinks
that he will do this.

“Oh god…” murmurs Tadeo.
“So, what’s next,” asks Luciano.

“Garry, can you clean up the parliament?” says Jayden.
“This case is over, the problem is solved now.”
2 days later

“Jayden! The medical results is out. His name is Justin
Herbert,” Luciano tells Jayden while he is walking in the room.
“Who’s that?” asks Jayden.

“Seriously Jayden, the killer?,” says Luciano.
“Oh, sorry I forgot that,” says Jayden.

“What he told us that day was true, his daughter was
killed,” says Luciano.

147



“Maybe we should check out that case again, at least help
him complete his last desire.” says Jayden. “But let's forget about
that now.”
“What do you mean?” asks Luciano.

“Calls Tadeo, Sharon, and Victoria, we’ll celebrate our
holidays!” says Jayden.
“Wait, really?”

“Yes, the chief told me this morning that he gave our team
a two weeks holidays.” says Jayden.
“And I will go to the beach and going out in the sun,
sunbathing on the beach.” Jayden says to himself.

“However, I think the company will be in a mess, you know
why?” Jayden asks.

“Why?” asks Luciano curiously.

“Because the most handsome and smartest guy is not
here!”
“...” Luciano is in a silence

“Wait… isn’t that funny?” asks Jayden. “Okay, I’ve got the
answer now.”

- Sirapop (Ray) Yimyam -

“It was too soon, Files, too soon.”
“Oh, it definitely was, Roid. I’m sorry for your loss…
Everything’s gonna be fine. Just… Try to relax and rest up.” Files,
my best friend looked at me with sympathy. In his eyes, I could see
that he did not know what to do in this situation. Maybe it was the
first time that he lost his confidence in his speaking skills.
I was at a school festival when an accident happened.

People that I loved and admired were gone. “Oh, God. How
horrible... It will be hard for that boy.” “I’m sorry for the boy. He
is only fifteen, and now he has to live alone.” Words of sympathy
and commiseration were heard everywhere I went. I didn’t need
those. My own will was strong enough.