Cold Cut

1 The night the Stone family finally acknowledged me as their own, a thunderstorm was raging. I was, after all, the nation’s lead forensic pathologist. I stepped into the grand foyer, my silver examination case in hand. The heavy, cloying stench of death that clung to my clothes instantly suffocated the delicate, expensive fragrance that filled the mansion. My adopted sister, Isabelle, pressed a hand to her nose, a flash of disgust in her eyes. She quickly masked it with a look of feigned concern, reaching for my case. “Ava, you must be exhausted coming home so late. That case looks heavy, let me help you.” With a practiced clumsiness, she let the case slip from her grasp. It crashed onto the marble floor with a sickening clang. CLANG! The latch sprang open. A slick, rubbery length of intestine, bleached pale by formalin, slithered out and came to rest on her delicate designer heel. The air went dead silent. I impassively pulled on a pair of latex gloves. 【Oops. Such clumsy hands. That was a fresh sample from a bloater, you know. I was hoping to reconstruct the full set.】 【But since you’re so curious, little sister, I don’t mind giving you a live demonstration of how to stuff this back where it belongs.】 【Or… maybe I could borrow your stomach for a little practice? Your heart’s already black, so it wouldn’t hurt to crack you open and take a look, would it?】 “Urgh—!” My older brother, Liam, a surgeon, caught a clear view of the coiled mass. His face turned a pasty white as he clutched his stomach and bolted for the nearest bathroom. Arthur Stone, my stern and imposing father, went wide-eyed. The string of prayer beads in his hand snapped, scattering across the floor as he crumpled in a dead faint. The entire family, who had gathered to put me in my place, now lay in a neat, unconscious row on the floor. 2 My mother, Eleanor, came to with a gasp after a maid pinched the skin above her lip. The moment she saw me, she began to tremble uncontrollably. Liam, my brother, had to brace himself against the wall to keep from collapsing again. Isabelle, ever the graceful actress, glided toward me, reaching out to take my hand. I sidestepped her touch. She retracted her hand awkwardly, her face still a perfect mask of gentle vulnerability. “I’ve already prepared a room for you, Ava. Please, come see if you like it.” I followed her down the hall. The room she showed me was a confection of pink frills and girlish decor, right next to her own. The air was thick with a sickly-sweet perfume. I wrinkled my nose. “I won’t be staying here. This style isn’t for me.” Liam looked ready to scold me for being ungrateful, but then he heard my thoughts. 【What a mess. Blood spatter would be a nightmare to clean off these pink walls.】 【I need something more secluded. The utility closet downstairs looked promising. No windows, far from their rooms. Perfect for late-night dissections without being disturbed.】 The blood drained from my brother’s face, leaving it a ghastly white. My father, Arthur, spoke with a noticeable tremor. “Then… you can take the utility closet for now. I’ll have the staff clear it out for you…” I cut him off. “Don’t bother. I’ll handle it myself. Just have a shower stall installed for me.” 【And make sure the drainage is industrial-grade. It’ll make disposing of tissue fragments much easier. Wouldn’t want to clog the plumbing.】 I saw my father’s vision swim. He swayed on his feet but managed a weak, terrified nod. Isabelle, oblivious to the undercurrent of horror, had a flicker of triumph in her eyes. She assumed I had angered our father and was being punished with the junk-filled closet. I ignored them all. I walked to the closet at the end of the ground-floor hall and pushed open the door. A wave of musty air hit me. I knocked on the thick concrete walls, satisfied. 【Good soundproofing, too. The sound of a bone saw at night probably won’t even wake them.】 Outside the door, my mother, who had just been helped to her feet by Liam, heard that last thought. Her eyes rolled back in her head, and she collapsed again in a neat pile. Dinner was as silent as a morgue. The long dining table was laden with an exquisite spread, but no one dared touch their food. The family sat stiffly, their posture rigid with fear. A news report was playing on the television in the corner. “…police today discovered a dismembered male body in the outskirts of the city. The brutality of the crime is shocking, and authorities are pursuing all leads…” The body on screen was heavily censored, but the scattered, blocky shapes were still disturbing. Isabelle covered her eyes with a delicate hand, leaning weakly against my mother. “How awful. The world is full of such cruel people.” I stared at the screen, my brow furrowed. 【Huh? Isn’t that the case I worked on a few weeks ago? They’re only releasing the news now?】 【The department’s getting slow. Their press releases are always late.】 【That guy had a rough end, though. Dismembered piece by piece while still alive. They even injected him with a neurostimulant to keep him fully conscious, forced to watch himself being taken apart.】 Liam, being a doctor, immediately visualized the scene I described. A wave of nausea washed over him. He couldn’t hold it back; his face went pale and he scrambled from the table, rushing to the bathroom to be sick. The commotion startled my mother, whose head lolled to one side as she fainted for what felt like the tenth time. Chaos erupted. Only Isabelle remained, looking baffled. She couldn’t understand why her family had suddenly become so squeamish. My father, Arthur, tried to maintain his composure. His hand trembled as he reached for a glass of water. Just then, a loud, piercing siren blared through the silent dining room. WEE-WOO-WEE-WOO! The entire family, including Liam who had just staggered back from the bathroom, jumped out of their skins. Unfazed, I pulled my phone from my pocket. “It’s for me,” I explained flatly. A tidal wave of horror washed over my father’s face. He thought my audacity knew no bounds—that I was using a police siren as a ringtone while committing such atrocities. A blatant mockery of the law! I was oblivious to his internal drama as I answered the call. “What’s up?” “Yeah, another one?” I listened, a slight frown forming. “Blunt force trauma to the skull this time? Okay, I’m on my way. Keep the scene secure.” I hung up, wiped my mouth with a napkin, and stood to leave. “Stop!” My father slammed his hand on the table, jolting to his feet. “Ava Stone! Where do you think you’re going at this hour?” His veins bulged on his forehead. “I’ll give you money! Whatever you want, I’ll give it to you! Just… just stop doing this!” 【Money?】 【Does he think this is about money? The department called. If I don’t take the case, someone else will get the credit.】 Hearing this, the anger on my father’s face froze, replaced by a deeper, more profound despair. He exchanged a look with Liam. All color had drained from their faces. “She… she has a team…” Liam muttered, horrified. My father collapsed back into his chair, utterly defeated. I, meanwhile, just thought they were being bizarre as I turned and walked out the door. This case was a tricky one. Two victims. One had fallen from a height, crashed through a glass ceiling, and then fallen again. The other was a bloater, pulled from a lake after being submerged for weeks, a grotesque caricature of a human being. By the time I finished processing both scenes, it was past midnight. The storm had returned, and fat raindrops hammered against my car’s windshield. I drove back to the Stone estate, my body heavy with exhaustion. The lights in the living room were still blazing. As I pushed the door open, the sterile scent of formalin and the faint, underlying odor of decay overwhelmed the house’s expensive potpourri once more. The Stones were sitting on the sofa, a grim welcoming committee. Isabelle shot to her feet, her nose wrinkled in theatrical disgust. A moment later, it was replaced by a mask of worry as she hurried towards me. “Ava, you’re back so late! What is that smell on you?” Before I could answer, she lunged for the evidence case in my hand. “Let me get that for you, you look exhausted.” She was fast, and she caught me off guard, snatching the case. Then, with a "stumble" that was anything but accidental, she cried out. “Ah!” CRASH! The metal case hit the polished marble floor. The latch popped. Several specimen jars containing organs bleached white by formalin rolled out. A length of intestine, still bearing traces of its former contents, landed with a wet slap on the plush rug. “Ava, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to—” Her words died in her throat the moment she saw what was on the floor. Her pretty face went sheet-white. A wave of sickness overcame her, and she doubled over, vomiting right there. 【You wanted to play games. You just couldn’t keep your hands to yourself.】 【There you go. I didn’t want to expose my work, but you forced my hand.】 【Since you love it so much, take a good long look.】 【Now… what am I going to do with all of you?】 I pulled on a fresh pair of latex gloves and calmly bent down, picking up the slick, wet organ from the floor. Then, I rose and walked over to where Isabelle was heaving, holding the intestine right in front of her face. “You wanted a closer look, didn’t you?” She looked up in terror, her eyes meeting mine before flicking down to the object inches from her nose. Her eyes rolled back, and she fainted. 【So fragile. You shouldn’t start fights you can’t finish. You brought this on yourself.】 I stood, the intestine still in my hand, and slowly turned. BOOM! A bolt of lightning tore across the sky, and the grand chandelier above us flickered violently. In the strobing light, my parents and brother saw a terrifying tableau: me, standing over Isabelle’s unconscious body, holding a piece of a human corpse. The effect was cinematic. The three of them didn’t even have time to scream. Their eyes glazed over in unison, and they fainted, joining Isabelle on the floor. The living room was littered with the bodies of my family. I shook my head. “Well,” I said to the empty room, “a family should always stick together.” With a sigh, I went to work. First, I meticulously cleaned the floor and packed my "treasures" back into their case. Then, one by one, I dragged my family members back to their respective rooms and arranged them neatly on their beds. Only after all that was done did I retreat to my utility closet for a well-deserved sleep. Things were quiet for a few days after that. With no new cases, I was happy to stay in my new "lab," organizing my tools and files. My family, on the other hand, was walking on eggshells. They scurried away like mice whenever they saw me. Liam even took a leave of absence from the hospital, locking himself in his room all day. This strange truce lasted until my birthday. Seeing that I had remained "well-behaved" for several days and hadn't actually dissected any of them, Arthur began to relax. He decided to throw a lavish birthday party to officially introduce me, the true heiress, to his business partners and high-society friends. He tasked Isabelle with helping me get a dress. But Isabelle, traumatized and resentful after that night, saw an opportunity. She wanted to humiliate me. She never told me about the party or the dress. On the day of the banquet, I came home straight from the lab. Before I could even change out of my scrubs, a maid was rushing me toward the ballroom. My clothes carried the faint, unmistakable odor of the morgue—a smell I was so used to, I no longer noticed it. The moment I pushed open the ballroom doors, the chatter died. Every head turned. All eyes were on me. A few of the society wives standing near the entrance instinctively took a step back, fanning their noses dramatically. The whispers started immediately. “Is that the long-lost Stone daughter? Why is she dressed like that? She looks like she crawled out of a gutter.” “It’s not just how she looks, can you smell that? It’s some kind of chemical… utterly foul.” Isabelle rushed to my side, her face a mask of false sympathy. “Ava, why are you wearing your work clothes? Father told you to dress up!” she hissed, feigning panic. “Oh my goodness, did I forget to show you where the dressing room is? I have so many new gowns, you should have just asked me!” Just then, a booming, mocking voice cut through the murmurs. It was my father’s biggest business rival, the head of Russo Corp. He sauntered over, a champagne flute in his hand and a sneer on his face. “Well, well, Arthur,” he bellowed, pointing at me. “Did you dig this one out of a cemetery? She gives me the creeps!” My father’s face went rigid with fury. I lifted my head and stared coldly at the obnoxious Mr. Russo. 【This man… isn’t he Vincent Russo?】 【My contact at the Bureau told me to keep an eye on him. I wasn’t even looking for him, and he just serves himself up on a platter.】 【He won’t be running his mouth for much longer. Arrogant, even with one foot in the grave. I don’t mind working a little overtime to give him the final push.】 The moment that thought crossed my mind, it happened. “Aaargh—!” Mr. Russo clutched his head and let out a blood-curdling scream. His eyes bulged, and he fell backward like a felled tree. THUD! His heavy body hit the floor, and blood began to trickle from his nose and mouth. The entire ballroom was plunged into a dead, horrified silence. Everyone stared at me as if I were a witch who had just cast a deadly curse. My father pointed a trembling finger at me, his lips quivering, unable to form words. “…Was that… did you…?” I looked down at the twitching form of Mr. Russo and allowed a small, cold smile to touch my lips. 【Looks like I’ve got a new case.】 【All that arrogance, and he still ended up on my table. Metaphorically, for now.】

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