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| Photo by David Ohmer |
Death and Andi were currently trying to collect a soul, and
the collection had turned into a bit of a bear of a job. Or, more precisely, the person being
collected had turned into quite a bit of an asshole.
Maybe asshole is
too strong of a word. Obnoxious, belligerent,
and time-consuming might be better descriptions.
Any which way you care to describe it, this soul was being
awfully annoying, and Death had just been denied lunch, so she was having a
hard time keeping her cool.
Howard Fine, twenty eight, was an electrician, and had been
on the job when he’d suffered an unfortunate and rather fatal accident. He’d been working in a commercial building,
and had been twenty five feet up a ladder when he grabbed a live wire,
expecting it to be cold.
If the cardiac arrest hadn’t killed him, the brain damage
from the fall would have.
And now Howard was pissed off. He, that is to say, his soul, was walking
around the room, ranting.
“I locked that god damned circuit out myself,” Howard
said. “And I bet I know exactly who
unlocked it too. It was that idiot
fucking new guy. I don’t know how he
ever made it to journeyman, with the dangerous shit he’s always pulling.”
Death and Andi watched as he paced and ranted. Usually the souls would start to lose steam
after a couple of minutes and come along easily enough, but Howard seemed to be
get himself even more worked up.
Death was trying her best to be patient.
“There’s nothing you can do about that now, Howard. Would you come with me?” Death said, with as
much compassion and kindness as she could muster.
Howard didn’t seem to notice her.
“I’ve been working with this crew for five years and I
fucking told Bill to fire that kid after the first work, that he was going to
get somebody killed…” Howard said.
Death started to get a little annoyed. Time was passing, and she was going to have
to get to the next collection any second.
This guy seemed agitated enough that she wouldn’t really want to try and
bring him along to the next collection.
Chances were he’d just slow that down too.
Death reached her hand out to Howard during a lull in his
rant, and said, “Would you come with me please?”
Howard stopped pacing and focused his attention on Death
then.
“No, I won’t go with you.
I was just killed because of a careless asshole’s idiot move, and I’m not
ready to go yet,” Howard said. “So, how
about you and your spooky little girlfriend sit down over there and shut the
fuck up for a while.”
“Hey!” Andi said, and was about to tell Howard off when
Death decided she’d had enough.
“OK, I tried to be nice.
We’re going now,” Death said to Howard.
“I offered to bring you the easy way.”
Moving with a speed that shocked Andi, Death had crossed the
distance between herself and Howard, and had him in a headlock before Howard
had even thought to try and defend himself.
“We’ll all agree that your death was a tragedy, but I think
you’re going to come with me peacefully now, or else you’re going to end up
very uncomfortable. Am I clear?” Death
said. She squeezed Howard’s neck a
little tighter.
Howard struggled against Death’s grip for a moment, before
realizing that he was vastly out-powered.
Her arms were like iron, unmoving, not even giving a little bit as he
struggled. Finally, he gave up.
“OK, you’re clear,” Howard said.
“Excellent,” Death said. To Andi, she said, “I’ll be right
back.”
Death vanished, and Andi was alone in the room where Howard’s
body had fallen. Someone came in looking
for him, and then ran outside, cell phone in hand, to call an ambulance. A few minutes later, Death reappeared. Her hair was slightly disheveled.
“Did everything go OK?
You’re looking a little worse for the wear,” Andi said.
“Huh? Oh, yeah, everything went fine. I just firmly escorted Howard to the gateway,
and made sure he made it all the way through when it opened for him,” Death
said.
“OK, cool,” Andi said.
She wasn’t sure what “firmly escorted” meant when Death said it, but she
suspected it meant something along the lines of “picked his ass up and hurled
it like a rag doll.”
Death checked her phone to see when the next collection
was. They had five minutes.
She looked at Andi, and said, “I think you’re probably ready
to start following along with what I’m doing at collections. Once you’ve got the gist of it, I’ll start
letting you run some of them. For now,
we need to get you’re a clipboard and a stopwatch. I’ve got a stash of spares in my
apartment. I think what I’ll do is drop
you off there, and come back and pick you up again just a little later.”
Andi was a little confused.
“Why not just go to an Office Max or something to get a clipboard and
stopwatch? Just about any office supply
or drug store will have those.”
“Well, you’re right that you can get a stopwatch and a
clipboard pretty easily, but unlike me, you are not Death, so the tools you work
with are going to have to be warmed up already,” Death said.
“What do you mean, warmed up?” Andi said.
“Well, you don’t think I keep on top of all of the
collections I have to plan and oversee with a stopwatch that might otherwise be
used to time Physical Education classes, do you? You’re going to need something I’ve used
before. Luckily for you, I have some
spares,” Death said. “Anyway, time’s
wasting. Let’s go.”
The two of them walked outside, and got on to Death’s
waiting motorcycle. Seconds later they
rolled to a stop outside of a brick apartment complex. The building was
charming, old, and otherwise not noteworthy in any way. They were definitely in an urban area, but
Andi wasn’t exactly sure which city they might be in.
“Where are we?” Andi said.
“Outside my apartment,” Death said.
Death reached into her cloak, and pulled out a key. She handed it to Andi.
“It’s a spare. I’m on
the second floor, apartment 202. I have
a little stash of spare stopwatches and clipboards in the desk in the living
room. Pick out the ones that appeal to
you, and I’ll be back shortly to get you,” Death said. “Don’t snoop.”
“OK,” Andi said.
With that, Death rode away, vanishing just a couple hundred
feet away.
Andi turned and walked up the sidewalk to the front door of
the building. She tried the door, only
to discover it was locked. Working the
key in the door and getting it open before it locked itself again automatically
proved to be a bit of a challenge, but after a few minutes, Andi made it inside
and started up the stairs.
Andi wondered if it wouldn’t have been easier to just drop
her off outside and for her to simply go through the doors into Death’s
apartment, open a window and toss a stopwatch and a clipboard outside to pick
up when she got back downstairs, rather than having to fumble with the key and
doors.
Then she thought about what Death had said about the stopwatch
and clipboard being “warmed up,” and decided there had probably been a very
good reason for doing things this way.
She wondered if she would find out what that reason was, in time.
The lobby of the building had small, octaganol, black and
white tiles, and dark wood trim. The
stairs were on the right side of the room.
They were made of dark wood as well.
It seemed like a nice building.
Not particularly fancy, but not a dump either. Everything looked kept up.
Andi climbed the stairs to the second floor. The hallway had dark blue carpet and white
walls. It was well-lit, and there was a
big window at the end of the hall that let in a fair amount of daylight as
well.
Death’s door was the second one down the hall from the
stairway, on the right side. There was a
small plaque next to the door that simply said, “202”.
Andi put the key in the door, unlocked it, and walked in to
Death’s apartment.
She had to admit, it was a little underwhelming. She’d been expecting enormous, ancient,
leather-bound volumes. Skulls. Maybe a gargoyle or two. Certainly a lot of black.
Instead, there was a lot of light colored, modern
furniture. White and beige were the
dominant colors, with a few splashes of color here and there.
Death’s desk stood out among the efficient, modern
furnishings, however. It was the only
thing in the place that was immediately, obviously ancient. It was elaborately carved, and had an almost
bewildering number of little drawers and cubbies. There were a couple of huge,
ornate hourglasses on the top shelf of the desk, quietly hissing. Andi wondered what they were timing. There was also a small bell, about the size of
a glass for port wine, made of brass that had aged to a fine patina.
Andi jumped slightly when the bell rang itself. She wasn’t sure how a small brass bell could
sound final, but it did.
Her curiosity piqued, she reached to pick up the bell and
inspect it, and was shocked when it moved itself out of her reach.
“OK, sorry,” Andi said to the bell, then felt a little silly
for apologizing to a bell.
She took a good look at the desk, and was a little dismayed
that there weren’t any clipboards or stopwatches that were sitting out in an
obvious spot. She sat down in the desk
chair, which was incongruously modern, although it was upholstered in black leather.
In the middle drawer of the desk, there was an incredible
assortment of writing implements, quills, and pieces of chalk, and some things
she didn’t recognize that were clearly for writing, along with a few fine
fountain pens and a staggering assortment of cheap disposable pens and number
two pencils.
No stopwatches or clipboards, though.
She opened one of the larger drawers, which immediately
slammed itself shut again. Andi had the
strangest feeling that she was being rebuked by the drawer.
“Sorry, I’m just looking for a clipboard,” Andi said.
One of the other drawers opened itself then, just a
little. Andi grasped its handle and
opened it the rest of the way. There was
a pile of clipboards, in varying states of use and repair. There were also slates, and what Andi
suspected were wax tablets.
Andi reached into the draw and selected one of the clipboards
that looked pretty well used, but not obviously broken. The back board was a little battered and
worn, but the clip still seemed strong.
It would do. She set the
clipboard on top of the desk.
“OK, where are the stopwatches?” Andi asked the desk.
This time, nothing happened.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude if I was. Could I have a stopwatch, please?”
Still nothing. Andi
exhaled sharply.
“Fine, I’ll just find them myself, if you’re going to be
that way,” she said.
She opened and shut several of the drawers and little doors
in the desk. A few of them slammed
themselves shut, but this time Andi wasn’t deterred, and opened them
again. After a couple of minutes, she
found a drawer that had an incredible assortment of clocks, wristwatches,
pocket watches and other timekeepers.
There were a few smaller hourglasses, and several fine timepieces (Andi
spied more than one swiss watch in the pile) among the less fancy quartz
watches, and dirt-cheap plastic stopwatches.
Andi reached for one of the beautiful, mechanical
stopwatches, only to have to move away from her hand.
“OK, not you then,” Andi muttered. She reached for another, a brass pocket
watch, which also rushed away when she tried to pick it up.
Andi sat back in the desk chair and thought for a
second. She remembered that Death
currently carried a plastic stopwatch (it was bright red), and figured there
was probably a good reason for it. It
also occurred to her that borrowing a stopwatch that was a piece of functional
art might just be a little presumptuous.
Perhaps she should just take one of the cheap stopwatches for now, and
upgrade later.
There were several cheap stopwatches in the drawer. Andi decided on a purple one, although she
was somewhat tempted by one that was vibrantly green. The purple stopwatch did not flee from
her. She set it on top of the clipboard,
and closed the drawer of timepieces.
Andi looked around the room, and was beginning to feel
tempted to explore Death’s apartment some more when she heard a motorcycle come
rumbling up outside. She picked up her
clipboard and stopwatch, and hustled out of Death’s apartment, locking the door
behind her.
“You didn’t have any trouble finding them, did you?” Death
asked her.
“Nope, it was a piece of cake,” Andi said.
“Really? That desk can be a real pain in the ass sometimes,”
Death said. “Well, good. Come on, we’ve got a death to attend to in
three minutes.”
