THE STOCKROOM was one of the places that had mirrors. Either clear or blur, they had a wide variety of reflectors in here. From the dusted glossy object that hadn't been touched since three months ago, up to this one that imprisoned a lady on her way to her destination using the corridor.

Thalia Valdez, staring herself on the mirror, at least her appearance was not that terrible as what she might have thought, she found herself wondering about this tiny thing on her hair: a single strand had a different color compared to the rest.

As soon as she noticed it, she disregarded the remaining problem that concerned about how she looked recently than apparently. For her hair color was naturally blond, and thus it proved that she was the daughter of two blond couple, there was this one that had a color of silk.

From the moment she got a hold of that long fiber attached to her scalp, the thought of being not the child of her known father hadn't entered her mind. Time sure flew fast, and the only reason why she had this, was that, she was aging.

"Am I already this old to have a white hair?"

As of now, Thalia was a twenty-eight years old guidance counselor. With three days far on her twenty-ninth birthday, the idea of completely white colored hair hadn't struck her mind not until she saw a proof that instantly the word 'Aging' existed in her life vocabulary.

The fact was always there: she was aging, slowly but surely. And it was like: not now but later. With her lifespan, she would live with it together with the rest of the world.

"Well, nevermind."

All was settled and she was just fine with that. She was aging. Planning to leave the stockroom, she turned around to retract her pace.

Without her knowledge, as she made that turn, perpendicular to her spot, connected by an imaginary hypotenuse, was the view that would make her change her perspective.

From keen to aging and now to uncertain: everything in life was full of surprises. She stared at the spot that was perpendicular to her. Just like how she did with the mirror that was placed on the wall on her side, it made her draw a reaction of a negative kind of surprise: her eyes narrowed.

"What the?!"

Blood, eyeball, and a cadaver: inside the stockroom where she just came in only to have a look of herself on the mirror, if she was keenly beautiful, she's then about to witness the mystery why the stockroom was for AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY.

By the very view that a dead person and whose death was insufferable as what it was to describe, stiffen at her spot for this was a first of her life, she herself became hesitant of what to do.

The door was wide open and easy to access, she could just escape her way out from here; her cellphone was placed in her shoulder bag, that made everything a few clicks to inform everybody especially the authority; lastly, she had a voice to shout to grab the attention of anyone and to make them notified about her discovery. But instead, even though she had no guts to face this such scenario even if they were just movies and this one was a reality, the curiosity drove her in.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Slowly she held her pace, just like how a thief in the middle of the night snuck inside other people's territory to nab something that they might find valuable, Thalia Valdez acted like one. Walking pace after pace with no sound that came from her stiletto heels. She got near to the cadaver of the uniformed personnel.

Stamped in the puddle of human body red pigmented fluid of himself, equipped by an ID for easy recognition and whose face had one less eye, she took a look of the coated beam which undeniably became the source of his death. Her stare grew.

Lance Reyes as what written on his ID Card-- that although it swam in blood, it retained its own physical state-- slipped on the chair above the table where he used both to achieve tall height, had been pierced by a standing beam. Now his left eyeball stared the ceiling innocently.

Lifeless eyeball with no lid wide openly gazed the only panel it could possibly see. Upon she approached the puddle, she skipped her step and walked on other direction where the wet surface was absent. She noticed something.

"Why it becomes so cold so suddenly?"

It was like a functioning refrigerator, only that, the door was left open and that let the cold air escalated. Getting colder and colder she instantly knew where its source. Not in here, but above.

"An air-con above?"

She took a look overhead where the panel of the ceiling separated the stockroom and the attic, just as also she went to look what laid above, the darkness had been thwarted by light. From no visibility, the light appeared. Being surprised of what welcomed her at this very portion, the reason why the utility personnel named Lance Reyes lost his life due to an accident, was that, the decomposed body of the four months missing keen principal was what hung at the very entrance between the stockroom and the attic.

"This can't be!"

Once again her eyes narrowed. From the moment the guard noticed that the Principal III of the Xyrale High School went missing and the biometric logging device told them he wasn't out of school, they started to search the entire premise.

From his office, even if he wasn't already there, they sought for any notice for ransom left behind; to the farthest reaches of this territory, where he might be slaughtered and thus waiting to be recovered; reviewing the Closed Circuit Televisions had revealed nothing, he was just disappeared like a bubble in the humid air, he couldn't be found.

With no lead where he was, they landed up on declaring the principal was AWOL. Absent Without Leave. Four months later the heresy was proven to be a mistake to the mind's eye of Thalia Valdez. For right now, the cadaver was hung in the attic with her staring it feeling awful.

The rod that restrained the principal from falling below was already four months in service, but before that four months began it was already in use. Serving its purpose on a suspended weight, it looked like it would tear in no time, the fibers were at its limit and Thalia foresaw that one coming.

Seeing the rod struggled against the gravity, and where she was in the pace of the dead principal, she made a backward retraction. On the first pace, she estimated the length of the befalling cadaver, that pace was not enough, she made another one.

Expecting that her footwear would land on the same floor just like what happened to all the paces she did inside the stockroom, she was wrong. That move would bring her one step closer to death.

While attracted to the view at the ceiling, she forgot that there was a body that was in the process of post-mortem that had been placed on her back. She stepped on it. She outbalanced.

"Ouch!"

Even though she hit her head on the floor, which made her blond hair coated with blood, she was still alive.