One Year Later — 6:00 PM
They called it a miracle.
They called it a rebirth.
They should've called it a warning.
Pier Seven had been rebuilt—bigger, sleeker, "safer." High-end restaurants stretched over the ocean, LED lights danced under glass floors, and influencers flooded social media with hashtags like #PierReborn and #SevenLivesAgain.
But the air?
The air still remembered the screams.
And Death… had been patient.
The New Ten
Ten new lives.
Ten ticking clocks.
KAI – 20, thrill-seeking free runner with a GoPro and zero fear.
LEILA – 22, architecture student who helped design the new pier's layout.
OMAR – 24, pier security guard with a tragic family history tied to the original incident.
NIA – 19, café barista with synesthesia; sees colors in people's voices.
BROOKE – 23, local news intern covering the grand reopening.
TREY – 21, street magician performing for the crowd.
ISABEL – 25, nervous blogger chasing conspiracies about Pier Seven's "curse."
LUKE – 27, former firefighter now working in pier maintenance.
VALERIA – 22, oceanography student with a fascination for deep-sea myths.
CODY – 20, TikTok prankster who faked a ghost sighting during the original pier collapse.
They didn't know each other.
They were never meant to.
But fate threads even strangers with the same string.
6:30 PM — The Ribbon-Cutting
Music boomed.
Drones flew overhead recording the cheers.
The mayor gave a hopeful speech.
Leila stood proudly in front of her design, beaming.
Trey flipped a coin and made it vanish.
Brooke adjusted her mic.
Cody filmed himself fake-choking on cotton candy.
"This pier's gonna kill me," he joked.
The laughter was loud.
Too loud.
Because Eva—watching from a hospital window, her wrists bandaged and her eyes hollow—felt something shift.
She stood and whispered.
"It's starting again."
7:10 PM — The Warning
Nia screamed.
Her iced coffee spilled on the boardwalk.
"Why are you screaming?" Brooke asked.
Nia pointed to the stage.
The mayor's microphone glitched—screeching static in shades of black and crimson Nia had never seen before.
A nearby banner ripped itself from its metal pole, lashing out like a whip in the windless evening.
Kai caught it before it hit a child.
Everyone laughed.
But Leila didn't.
She saw the cracks beneath the new glass floor.
Hairline.
Silent.
Spreading.
7:30 PM — The Vision
Leila's head snapped back.
Her hands went cold.
The world around her melted into flames.
A cable snapped, whipping into Trey's throat, slicing it open.
Brooke was crushed under a falling light rig.
Nia was impaled through the chest by a broken surfboard launched by an explosion.
Omar fell through glass, landing on exposed rebar.
Luke was electrocuted when he grabbed a sparking railing.
Kai was sliced in half by collapsing glass panels as he tried to save someone.
Isabel tried to run—a metal support beam fell and crushed her spine.
Valeria drowned in a rising tank, her cries muffled by churning saltwater.
Cody's prank backfired as fire devoured his fake ghost costume, the heat melting his plastic mask into his face.
And Leila…
She was the last to die.
Burned alive in the belly of her own design.
She screamed—
And woke up.
7:31 PM — Back to Reality
People were clapping.
The mayor hadn't even cut the ribbon yet.
Leila gasped.
She stumbled back, shaking, drenched in sweat.
Something had changed.
The pier had been reborn.
But Death never forgets.
End of Volume Two, Chapter 15