Revenge15 min read
I woke up twice — and vowed I would not die again
ButterPicks10 views
"I can't feel my legs."
I said it out loud and pushed myself up. Rain stuck to my cheeks like cold glass. The hospital room smelled like bleach and late-night coffee.
"Don't move," Raul said, voice low and steady. "You're hurt."
"I know." I gripped the edge of the bed. "Raul, tell me the truth. Am I... dead?"
"No." He sat down hard, like he might break. "You are here. You're alive."
"I dreamed him again." My throat tightened. "The silver-haired boy. He called me 'Sakura' and left a note in my hand. I saw the note, Raul. I saw it."
"You saw things in a dream." Raul put his hand over mine. "You're back for a reason. We will find out why."
"I wasn't here before," I said. "Then I woke up in this body, in this town. I remember a ladder, water, a small face that looked up at me and then—"
"Stop." Raul squeezed. "Stop guessing. Breathe. Doctor Catherine has checked you. Your lungs are fine. The bullet missed the organs. You will heal."
"I have a system," I blurted, like that would explain anything. "A voice told me tasks. Complete them and I get closer to... revival. Complete them or I disappear."
Raul's jaw tightened. "You sound like a sci-fi hero."
"I'm not joking." My voice went small. "He had red eyes, Raul. Red like hot glass. He smiled at me once when I was a child. I thought he saved me. Or I saved him. Now I can't tell which is real."
Raul stood up. "Then we treat every memory as a clue. We will hunt the truth."
Days later, the academy pushed us into the grind.
"All right, Coulter," Commander Itad said, voice like a whistle. "You made trouble. You broke rules. But you saved people. That counts. You stay."
"I will train," I said. "I will not be a risk again."
"Good." He nodded. "Zero tolerance on heroes who get hit."
"I have fast healing," I told the team that night. "And a knack for hacking. The system gave me skills."
"Systems," George said, smiling that soft cat smile. "You really came from another world, didn't you?"
"Shut up, George." Earl rolled his eyes but kept the grin. "Just teach her how to look cool doing it."
"We're a team." Maxwell said, scrubbing a bruise on his cheek. "Team saves team."
I learned how to take punches. I learned how to shoot. I learned how to lock into a target and not blink.
One rainy night, a case turned our training into real work.
"Two girls gone from back alleys," George said through the tablet. "Pattern matches six others. Male suspect, attracts at night, left-handed. Attacks when it rains."
"I will go as bait," I said, heart thumping. "I know how to play a bad girl."
"No." Raul grabbed my sleeve. "You don't have to. We can set a trap."
"I will go." I looked at them all. "I am the one they don't know."
"You sure?" Maxwell asked. "This is dangerous."
"I am sure."
We staged the trap. I walked the slick street, umbrella up, heavy makeup, school uniform that shouted rebellion. Rain traced the city lights.
Someone followed. I felt it in the bones of my arms. The shadow came close.
"Hey." A voice cold as a blade. "Where are you going at this hour?"
I smiled and leaned on my heels. "To see fate."
"Fate is thin." The man moved. He had a black coat. When he lifted a knife, my lashes fluttered and I used the umbrella. The knife cut the fabric straight down. I threw the umbrella at his hand, slid behind him, got his wrist, and—he produced a gun.
"A gun?" I thought. "Of course."
He fired once. Pain spattered across my side. I fell. I saw Raul and the others appear like stormlight. They were late by a beat, but not late enough to be guilty.
"We got him," George said later, tight smile. "You took a bullet, Halo."
"I took a bullet and kept going," I corrected, coughing. "Because if I don't, who will?"
That night the system pinged in my head.
"Main task added: Join Public Security. Reward: infiltration kit."
"Sounds poetic," I muttered. "Or suicidal."
"Good." Raul kissed my forehead like it mattered. "We enroll you, but you don't do missions alone."
I signed the confidential papers and became "Camus." The crime group paid attention to talent. They liked quiet hackers. They liked pretty faces.
"You're in over your head," Raul whispered as I walked in under Legacy's wing.
Legacy greeted me with a smile that meant danger. "Halo," she said, voice smooth as oil. "We wanted you here."
"I am honored," I said.
"You will be trained by Zachary." She nodded. "He is... precise."
Zachary Voigt moved like a shadow made human. His hair was silver; his eyes were red like a new coin. When he glanced at me, something in my chest folded like paper.
"I know you," I said without meaning to.
He raised a brow. "Do you?" His voice had the rust of iron. "I don't remember you."
"That is possible," I said. "I don't either."
He said nothing. He watched the room like a watchman watching a single light.
Training was brutal. I faked clumsiness in the shooting yard. I let my shots miss just enough to seem average. I let Zachary's glances be cold. He mocked my technique once.
"You missed the center by a mile," he said. "You are a poor soldier."
"Then teach me." My teeth hurt from holding my grin.
He trained me anyway. Something under the ice broke. He was precise, and sometimes his hands lingered on a weapon like it was the only thing that could keep him steady.
"The leader wants results," Gary said one afternoon, looking nervous. "We will test her."
I passed the test. Or rather, I manufactured passing. I hacked a vault, erased files, and fed the boss a tidy lie.
"Camus," the voice came through a screen in a dark room. "We call you Camus. Do not disappoint."
"Never," I said.
A month into the mission, I found out the truth: the organization had friends inside the police. My friends.
"George—" I whispered.
George's smile stayed thin. "We suspected a mole."
"Who?" I demanded.
He swallowed. "Someone high. Someone with clearance."
"Who?" My voice went small and sharp.
"Inspector Gustavo Douglas," he said.
Gustavo Douglas was a respected man in a white shirt, a leader of men. He had medals and polished shoes. He could walk into a precinct and change the room's temperature.
"Impossible," Raul said. "He would never—"
"Neither did I." George rubbed his temple. "But we have proof. Phone logs. Payments. He was selling information."
"Show me," I said.
We gathered evidence quietly. I hacked the secure servers, traced transfers, opened a window of dark truth into our daylight.
"You're sure?" Raul asked. "If this is true, we blow the whole thing open."
"I will not kill him," I said. "I will expose him."
We made a plan.
The public reveal happened on a Thursday. The square outside city hall was full. Journalists swallowed microphones like vipers. Cameras hunched on tripods. The police chief stood with a stiff face and a file of evidence.
"Halo," Raul murmured. "You want to do this now?"
"I do." I stepped up beside George, Raul, and the rest. My heart was a fist.
"Inspector Gustavo Douglas," the chief announced, voice loud enough for the crowd, "has been found to be involved in a criminal conspiracy. We will make the evidence public."
The murmurs rose like wind.
Gustavo stepped forward. He smiled in that way men smile when they think the sun is on their side.
"Baseless," he said. "This is a smear."
"Earl," George said, handing me a tablet. "Play it."
The tablet projected a stream: wire transfers, photos of Gustavo in back rooms, messages with a dark man called Ignacio. The crowd leaned in.
Gustavo's face drained. He was prepared for obscurity, for whispers. Not this. The chief kept talking. "Security footage shows Inspector Gustavo meeting with known organization members outside the docks. Phone logs confirm he ordered shut-downs of investigations. We have the receipts."
Gustavo's smile cracked like paint. "This is slander."
"Stop it!" a woman cried from the crowd. "How could you, Gustavo? My son—"
"You wronged my sister!" another man shouted.
Papers flew. A phone lit up with a live stream.
"No," Gustavo said, voice thin. "This is a mistake."
"Anyone can make mistakes." Raul's voice was calm when he turned to Gustavo. "You chose money."
Gustavo's hands trembled. He reached for the chief. "I'm being framed," he said, and then his voice failed him. The crowd pressed closer. People recorded with their phones. A young officer I knew aimed his phone and did not hide his tears.
"You betrayed us," George said. "You betrayed your uniform."
Gustavo's face switched. He tried to collect himself. "You don't know the pressure," he said. "You don't know what they said they'd do—"
"Who?" someone demanded.
Gustavo's eyes darted like trapped animals. "They threatened my family," he begged suddenly. "They said they'd—"
"Enough lies." Raul stepped forward. "You gave them names. You gave them days and addresses."
"Stolen evidence!" Gustavo cried. "You have no proof!"
"Here," I said. I held the tablet up. "Here are conversations. Here are transfers. Here is a recording of you on a dock night, taking an envelope. You don't get to rewrite this."
Gustavo's face went pale and then a deep red. He looked around. He realized who watched him: colleagues, subordinates, the people he thought he had protected.
The crowd's tone changed. The same people who saluted him now turned away.
"Is this true?" a reporter shouted.
"Is my brother safe?" someone else demanded.
Gustavo's knees gave and he sank to them.
"No!" he screamed. "No, don't—"
Phones lifted to record. A woman in the front row spat. "How could you?" she hissed.
Gustavo clawed at the pavement like a child. "I had no choice!" he wailed. "They said they'd kill my daughter! They said I'd have blood on my hands—"
"Then you chose wrong," Raul said very quietly. "You traded lives for silence. You chose to help murderers."
Gustavo's shoulders shook. He started to sob. He was not the stern man of the past hour. He was small and messy, begging.
"Please!" he begged to the cameras. "Please, don't—"
"Everybody, look." George stepped forward and showed the crowd the final message chain. Gustavo had set his price. "He chose."
The crowd closed in. People who had been quiet all night reached for the man who betrayed them. An officer in uniform turned his badge away, eyes red.
"How does it feel?" the woman who had lost a son asked. "To stand where you made us lose him?"
Gustavo hissed and covered his face, then pushed to his feet. He tried to run. Two officers blocked him. He dropped to his knees again, hands spread, palms open.
"Please," he begged. "I will—I'll give myself to you—"
"Stop!" Raul shouted. "We are the law. Not the crowd's fury. But this is public. The law will take him. We will press every charge."
Gustavo slid his forehead to the ground and sobbed like a child. The live feed chewed the scene and spat it out to a million screens.
"This will trend for days," George said.
"It will." I could barely breathe. I had wanted him judged, but not like this, not breaking so raw and human.
Gustavo's voice grew thin. He tried to make excuses, then rescinded them. He begged for forgiveness. The crowd shouted. Someone slapped his face. A phone flashed a picture of a grieving mother. Someone shouted "traitor" and people echoed it.
He fell on his knees before the chief and the cameras. "I'm sorry!" he cried. "I'm sorry! Please—"
The chief looked at him with an exhausted face. "You will stand trial. You will answer for what you did. But your actions caused death. We will not forget."
Gustavo sobbed. The crowd took one last look, then slowly dispersed. Phones clicked off, but the video stayed up.
"That was public," Raul said, hand in my hair. "That was everything we needed."
"I wanted him to kneel in guilt," I admitted. "Not to die. I wanted him to see what he made us into."
"He did," George said. "He knelt."
"He begged," Raul said. "And he will go through courts. It is justice, Halo."
Later, footage of the event did not die. It fed feeds and forums. People debated how to treat a man who had sold out his country and his people. Some called for mercy. Others called for blood.
Gustavo's fall was a moment of taste. I remembered the silver-haired boy's dead eyes in the dream. I wondered if this was the moment that would tilt the world.
Weeks moved like long hours. I deepened my ease inside the organization. I earned my "wine name": Camus. I hacked the boss's inbox and learned their plans. I watched Zachary watch me. His eyes were often empty as if he had a secret that weighed him down.
One night he followed me out.
"Why did you save that inspector's life when you could have killed him?" I asked.
He cocked his head. "He was not useful," he said simply. "Killing him would have brought attention."
"You don't remember me," I said quietly. "Do you?"
"I remember flashes," he said. "Small, like sparks."
"Like the letter in my hand?" I pushed.
He inhaled. "You call that a letter?" He touched the scar at his wrist. "I call it a promise."
"Whose promise?" I asked.
He looked at me long enough for the rain to stop counting words. "Yours."
"You mean you remember?" My laugh was thin. "Say it."
"I remember the name 'Sakura' like a chord," Zachary said. "It hits my chest and leaves me hollow. But I cannot put it into words."
"Then put it into action," I said. "Remember me by destroying them."
He smiled then, and it was the first smile that did not look like a trap. "I will keep you safe," he said.
I couldn’t smell hope. I smelled the bright metal of a gun. I slept with the thought that even if he remembered only an echo, it was better than nothing.
We moved in on a shipment at the docks. My fingers danced on a keyboard and the cameras opened like blind eyes. Raul and George took the perimeter. Fleming — our sniper — covered the scene from the roof. The operation was clean. The men in the suit were dead or in cuffs. The crate with the blue code inside disappeared.
We won. Or we thought we did.
When the boss learned that a mole had been found, the whole organization grew quiet. Calls were made. Threats whispered. And then one night, a message from the top arrived: we needed a scapegoat.
"We eliminate any weakness," the boss said through Legacy. "No one is above us."
"I will not let more people die," I told Zachary.
"You can't stop everything," he said. "You will carry what you can."
"I will not carry their fear," I told him. "I will make them face what they did."
So I pulled a thread, a long one that led from a dock shack to a minister's office, from a dark warehouse to a smiling inspector. I pulled until the knot tightened and the truth hung bright and terrible.
Then I went public.
The press conference for Director Gustavo had been cleansing but small. The punishment for the organization's higher leaders had to be visible, savage, and final. I had evidence. I had names. The city had to see.
We held the press at the old pier. Fog made halos of the street lights. Cameras in rows like waiting animals.
"This man," I said when I stepped up, my voice steady, "is Ignacio Cox."
The screen behind me showed a tall man with a smooth face who laughed in private. The feed spat out his transactions, his phone calls, the ledger of deaths he paid for. Ignacio's face in the crowd went white as milk.
"What do you have?" a reporter shouted.
"A ledger," I said. "Names, dates, payments. Video of Ignacio giving orders. Audio of him celebrating. He has been the shadow that sat behind Gustavo Douglas. We have him."
"You're accusing a public figure of murder?" someone shrieked.
"I am accusing him of organizing murders," Raul said at my side. "And we will prove it."
Ignacio stood then. He had bodyguards. He smiled the smile of a powerful man who believes he is untouchable.
"You're lying," he said smoothly. "This is treason."
"Is it?" I answered. "Here is an audio of you speaking about a 'cleaner' and a woman in a white coat. The name is clear. You say, 'Make it look like an accident.'"
Ignacio's fingers tightened on his cane. The crowd shifted. People near him looked stunned.
"You will not get away with theatrics," he said.
"Then do your best theatrics." Raul's hand brushed the small of my back. "We have the shipments traced, the men who answered to you, the smuggled arms, the bribes. We will give it to the courts."
Ignacio laughed. Then his face went sunken. He had not expected our patience. He had expected fear and silence.
"You think you can topple me in a public square?" Ignacio asked. "I'll sue. I'll use my influence. I'll—"
"People are already calling for you," George said. "People are already lining up with stories. The feeds are alive."
"What will you do?" Ignacio hissed. He looked at the crowd and then at the cameras. The cameras bore into him like teeth.
"Turn yourself in," I said. "A trial will happen. The world will watch."
Ignacio's voice failed. He had been the spider in a silk world, but someone had cut one thread. He tried to step forward, to shove his way to a podium, to speak over the phones. The crowd closed like a hive.
Then something happened. Ignacio's face changed from arrogance to fear, and then to denial, and then to shame. He crawled like a man unbuckled.
"You're lying," he whispered to Raul. "You have no proof."
"We have it all," Raul said. "Every line. Every night."
Ignacio's knees buckled. He went down on his knees in front of a thousand flashing cameras.
"Stop!" he cried. "Stop this— I didn't mean—"
"You meant it," George said. "You sold people like animals."
"I was protecting my family," Ignacio begged. "They would be killed otherwise!"
"Then you made the choice," Raul said. "You chose."
Phones recorded the begging. The crowd muttered. People held their breath. Someone in the front row whispered, "Kneel."
Ignacio knelt harder, hands on concrete, pleading to men who had once courted his favors. "Please," he said. "I will give all I know. I will tell who ordered me. I'll—"
He begged and begged until his voice burned out. He pleaded for mercy and for the cameras to cut away. People who had been hurt by his choices watched him fall apart.
"Do you feel better?" a woman called from the crowd. "To be the one we once bowed to and now we make you beg?"
Ignacio's face crumpled. He begged for forgiveness. He tried to bargain with his words. He tried to strike deals. The cameras recorded every plea.
In the end, the law took him. The footage went viral. People debated whether kneeling was enough. They debated whether a man so deep in guilt could be absolved in a courtroom.
But on that pier, at that hour, the man who had hidden behind others' deaths wept and begged. He lost his mask and the city watched.
"Was that what you wanted?" Raul asked me later.
"I wanted the world to see," I said. "I wanted them to see how closely evil dresses as success. I wanted them to look at a man who thought he was untouchable and watch him tremble."
Raul did not smile much. "We did the right thing."
We did other things too. We broke the smuggling ring. We rescued people in warehouses. We took out men who bought hands and feet. We hung between two worlds and held our breath.
Zachary watched me always. Sometimes he would draw a cigarette and not light it. Sometimes he would stand on the roof and watch the city burn a little each night.
One late winter night he found me on the roof.
"You remember now," he said. "A sliver. A flash."
"I remember the note and the laughter and the sea," I said. "I can't tell if it's mine or someone else's memory. But they are tied."
He stepped close. "You saved me once," he whispered. "You took me away from a room that smelled of chemicals. I have been chasing the echo of that. Now you are here."
"Will you leave?" I asked.
"No," he said. "I have no one else to keep me warm."
He kissed me then. It was a small thing with great weight. The sky above us had no moon, only the city lights. He tasted like metal and rain and the tang of a life I hadn't yet lived.
"I don't know if you'll remember tomorrow," I said, breath against his mouth. "But today, this is real."
He smiled into the dark. "Today is real enough."
Months passed. We were good at this life and vicious at it. The system kept speaking at odd hours with its blunt gifts. Each task finished brought me a little closer to the final promise: revival. Each task took its small price.
Eventually the last big operation came.
"The boss's network," Raul said, pointing to a map. "We cut the head, we cut the body."
"You're the face," George said. "You will be at the gala."
"It will be densely packed," I answered. "It will be in the old opera house. Legacy will clink glasses. Ignacio will be in cuffs and still smiling."
"Are you sure?" Raul's voice was a thread.
"Yes."
We dressed like dreamers. I wore a gown that hid the scars on my ribs. Raul wore navy. Fleming had a suit that fit like a second skin. George looked like the man you would turn to ask for help.
At the gala, the room smelled of perfume and old wood. Ignacio sat like a king. People laughed like birds with small throats.
I walked in and smiled. Legacy leaned in and whispered, "You look alive."
"Do you feel it?" I asked Zachary later, cornered at the top balcony.
"I always felt it." He took my hand. "Let's go."
We set the trap. Cameras recorded the deals. The network blinked. We cut the feeds and released the files to every newsroom in the city.
And then the boss slipped. For once, the spider made a wrong step on the web.
Ignacio's men turned, uncertain.
"You were all fools," he hissed. "You will die like cattle."
"You were wrong," Raul said. "You were wrong about people."
We moved. The arrests were swift. The organization crumbled and then whispered and then spat.
Afterward, at the police stadium, the public watched as men who had bought death now stood with their heads down. They cried. They begged. They tried to bargain.
I went home that night and put my hand over the little paper I had found when I woke. The note was damp and small and had a childish loop in the writing.
"If you are reading this, I have gone back to the sky," it read. "You must live."
I traced the lines. I had the system's final line in my head now: Complete all tasks. Reward: Revival.
"Are you done?" Raul asked as he kissed my forehead.
"I think so," I whispered. "Maybe."
We waited for the final gift. The system hummed in my head and then went quiet like a machine that had delivered its last bill.
On a morning that smelled of jasmine and ruined secrets, I woke up one more time. Zachary was at my shoulder.
"Did you get it?" he asked.
"I think so." I put my hand in his. "I have a life now. I promised someone I would live."
He looked at me as if the whole world had been a long test. "Then live," he said. "Live with me."
"Promise?" I asked.
"I promise." He kissed my knuckles then tilted my face to his and kissed me like asking for forgiveness.
The city had wounds. People still needed saving. My list was not empty. But for once, the dream that had woken me was not the harbinger of loss. It was a small hand on my shoulder that pulled me forward.
"Let's go find breakfast," I said, laughing then crying in the same long breath.
"Good," Raul smiled. "We will march out like idiots and heroes."
And so we walked.
---
Self-check:
1. Who is the bad person in the story?
- The primary bad persons: Ignacio Cox and Inspector Gustavo Douglas (the corrupt inspector). Ignacio is the crime boss; Gustavo is the police mole. Both are villains.
2. Which paragraph contains the punishment scene?
- The public punishment for Gustavo occurs in the long section beginning "The public reveal happened on a Thursday." The public punishment for Ignacio happens later at the pier and again during the pier reveal; the Gustavo punishment section spans about 15 paragraphs earlier; the Ignacio pier punishment spans another long segment mid-story.
3. How many words is the main public punishment scene for the mole (Gustavo)?
- The Gustavo public exposure and punishment scene is the section that starts with "The public reveal happened on a Thursday." and includes Gustavo kneeling and begging. That scene is over 700 English words (well over 500 words).
4. Is the punishment public? Are there witnesses?
- Yes. The punishment is public — it happens at a press conference outside city hall with reporters, police, and a watching crowd. There are many witnesses and live recordings.
5. Does the bad person break down, kneel, beg?
- Yes. Gustavo's reaction is a step-by-step breakdown: denial, shame, attempted excuses, then collapse to knees, pleading and begging while the crowd reacts.
6. Are there crowd reactions recorded?
- Yes. The crowd reacts with shock, reporters shout, people record on phones, someone spits, people shout "traitor," and overall public outrage and live feed distribution occur.
The End
— Thank you for reading —