By: Jade Quinn

Luna stood there, dumbstruck by the strangest mirror she had ever seen, a thing that once had belonged to her twin sister Lupa, now dead. She couldn’t sort out how come the mirror, or whatever it was, looked so strange. In fact, it didn’t look like a mirror at all.

It was all dusty on the back, and on the side Luna was supposed to be seeing her own reflection, a weird teenager was barely visible through the queer mixture of pale and gray. As if that was not enough to make one jump given that it was to be an ordinary mirror, just looking at it gave you a bunch of peculiar sensations clearly not belonging to the person who was holding it.

Before today Luna hadn’t dared to fix her eyes for more than mere seconds on the mirror before. But now that she had nothing to do, she dared to hold it before her bare eyes, her hands shaking.

A half minute might have passed at most, Luna felt extremely dizzy and numb. Somewhere inside her a small voice was telling her to put the mirror down, but nevertheless she tried hard to do so, her hands were too numb to move at all. She felt as though the whole world was a mixture of pale and gray, revolving around her at an astonishing speed. Her head seemed like it would fall any time from now, that it was so light. Her vision was blurred, her ears were flushing with streams of blood and her stomach felt unnaturally queasy.

By the time her vision had cleared, Luna was no more in her bedroom, though the place looked familiar enough. In a moment of horror she realized…it was the place Lupa was murdered a whole decade ago…

She hadn’t been there, of course, but the eyewitnesses had been enough to provide what exactly had happened. Knowing what terror was awaiting her, Luna stared at the street called Keystone, yet she kept wishing had she not touched the mirror, she would have been perhaps a lot happy. By no means was Luna willing to witness her sister’s murder…at least not through Lupa’s own eyes…

A girl, nearly sixteen or seventeen, walked down the Keystone Street. She wore a worried expression. She had never been seen so anxious before. Muttering furiously to herself, wearing tattered jeans and an old T-shirt, she gave a shudder over a thought. What if he’s waiting for me here? What if…he said he would be there, didn’t he? Reckon I’m making the wrong decision…

She looked at her sides and was relieved to find no one was visible, at least not a boy of her age with jet black hair and a smirk permanently plastered on his face. She sighed, but just then the boy with the smirk appeared.

Immediately realizing what was going to happen, the girl attempted to escape, but her legs felt as though they didn’t belong to her. ‘Please, Titus, please, not today,’ she begged to the boy, but there was not a single look of mercy or pity on his hard face.

‘Ah,’ he said coldly. ‘Sorry to say, Lupa Carson, but it’s too late. Not my fault, anyway. If you weren’t that stupid it’d be a lot better, what d’you say, huh?’ Titus shrugged.

‘But…but Titus, what did I do?’ Lupa asked, shivering with fear, not cold.

‘Whoa, what did you do?’ he said even more coldly. ‘You think you didn’t do anything, huh? You probably didn’t, by your standards, girl, but by mine, you refused to…well, hand me over your cutie sister.’

‘WHAT?’ she bellowed. ‘Is that all? You’re doing it just because I sacrificed that stupid diamond necklace for my sister? IS THAT ALL? Didn’t you want to get rich, Mr Skelton? You got the most precious jewel in this country now, okay? You’re rich, okay? What else do you want, Titus?’

An evil smile spread across Titus’s face. ‘Ho-ho, girl, calm down, will you? Now, the thing is that, you already do know, of course, but in case you keep pretending that you don’t, I’d like to tell you that what else I want is your sister, Lupa, your sister. Luna Carson is her name, in fact. So, little miss, you are well aware that the necklace is no use to me…well, because that silly sister of yours can make it of any use to me…getting back to the point, if you don’t just hand her over to me, it would cause me a bit of trouble, you see, but I’d get my hands on her at last anyway. So now, will you mind telling me what you choose for yourself and your dear sister?’

Lupa was shaking, but no trace of fear nor giving in was visible on her face. ‘Okay, then, Titus, I’m telling you, you won’t be able to get your hands on my sister, because you’ll have to kill me first.’

Still looking directly into his eyes, Lupa reached her jacket’s pocket and did something that vaguely looked like tapping a few times. ‘And,’ she continued, her hand still in her pocket, ‘if you kill me, then your chances of getting my sister are zero because you will be then in prison for the rest of your life for a murder, theft and, uh, intention to harm the country, I suspect?’

Titus looked taken aback for a while, but came to his senses in almost no time. ‘As long as we are in this ruddy street, it’ll take the police ages to find us, Lupa. Now, will you please let me mark you last words?’

Panic was starting to take over Lupa. She knew perfectly well there was no way out as she looked hopelessly into her pocket. It was useless trying to buy some time. Titus was quite right: it would take the police ages to find them in the Keystone Street, and before it did, Titus would have fled leaving no sign of him. There were a few houses, though, but the legend said they were haunted, so only a fool would dare living there. Help was impossible in the deserted street. Lupa deeply regretted taking the shortcut through there.

She drew a deep breath. ‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Okay. Okay, Titus, okay. Mark my last words, Titus.’ Lupa Carson looked straight into his cold blue eyes, rage filling her own, and added in a short hiss afterwards through gritted teeth, ‘Titus, remember, people are too forgetful to reminisce the dead, much less there’s an eye watching them all the time that…’

Lupa never finished the sentence, her very last sentence. The bullet shot from Titus Skelton’s gun had finished her off in no time…

CRACK!

Luna came to her senses. Her vision was once again blurred, her ears still flushing with streams of blood, and she was as shocked as ever; however, a few words kept buzzing inside her head for the rest of her life, haunting her down: People are too forgetful to reminisce the dead, much less there’s an eyes watching them all the time from…the most unfinished thing ever life could give her…