Chapter 19
Ares was extremely frustrated. He’d been wandering new battlefields and old familiar haunts and had not seen a single fatality. Sure, there was shooting and explosions and general mayhem, which was great, but it didn’t add up to much when everyone just kept staying alive.
His attempts to assist soldiers in their shuffle off the mortal coil had been disastrous. Of the eighty people he’d personally tried to kill, all of them were still moving around and being generally obnoxious and alive. In fact, it looked like someone he’d tried to help was running up to him.
The someone was carrying his head under one arm like a football. There was most of a neck sticking out the top of a blood-stained, dust-colored shirt. Its clothes were filthy, and its movements were jerky, like every movement required a great deal of force.
“How the hell is your body moving around with no brain connected to direct it?” Ares asked in an annoyed tone of voice.
“Fucked if I know, asshole. I guess I just figured it out while my head was rolling around in the street. Seemed like a good idea to get my body moving and pull my skull out of traffic,” the body said. It’s voice had an odd, buzzing quality to it. Ares realized that there was no actual mouth to shape the sounds coming from its vocal cords. He was confused - there was no way a body with no head should be able to talk - but mainly irritated by this person’s refusal to properly die.
“Hey, no need to get pissy with me. I didn’t mean to leave you alive,” Ares said. “I killed you pretty damn well. It’s never been a problem before.”
“You’re a dick! What the hell good is it to be alive with my head no longer attached to my body?”
“Well, if you’re going to be like that, what the hell good is it to be alive anyway?” Ares asked. He walked towards the troublesome headless man.
“Hey, you stay away from me,” the headless man said, and started to back away. He held his free arm out in front of him, trying to fend off Ares. It, of course, didn’t work.
“No, no, I did the job half-assed, and you deserve better than that,” Ares said. He snatched the bodies head away, and said, “This oughta do the trick though.”
He threw the head overhand in front of a passing tank. The head’s body chased after it, but didn’t arrive in time. The head was crushed under the treads of the tank, leaving behind a gruesome mess. The body hugged itself as the tank passed over the head, and as soon as it had passed set to work picking up what it could.
It turned and gave Ares the finger. Well, it seemed to. It was certainly in the right general direction.
“Huh,” Ares said, then shouted, “Hey! Sorry about that! Come on over here and I’ll take care of you for sure this time!”
The body ran. Of course, with no way of guiding itself, it stumbled into what had been an empty field until its recent conversion to a minefield. The body made it roughly five steps before being blown into several chunks. The remaining bits continued to move around, without direction. One of them managed to find another landmine and set it off, sending bits of finger and arm flying in all directions.
“Damn it,” Ares said. “I’ve got the worst case of blue balls in the history of the world!”
#
Hephaistos was shaping the fenders for Ares’s motorcycle when Scroat came into the workshop carrying a newspaper.
“Hey, take a look at this crazy shit,” Scroat said, and held a folded-over newspaper out to Hep. “People have apparently stopped dying.”
No Deaths Worldwide in Two Months, read the headline. The article went on and explained that there had been no deaths reported, anywhere. No military casualties. No deaths at retirement homes. No deaths in hospitals. Nothing. The article went on to say that several governments were urging their citizens to consider the decision of whether or not to have children very carefully.
Hep looked up and Scroat and handed the paper back.
“Fucked up, huh?” Scroat said.
“Yeah. It doesn’t really impact us, though,” Hep said, and turned back to the fender he was working on. There was a dimple he’d made while doing the rough shaping, and he was having a hell of a time getting it smoothed out.
“Well, not yet. But you know people. They always find some stupid way to fuck everything up,” Scroat said.
“It’s not really my problem what happens in the world of mortals anymore. It’s not your problem either,” Hep said. He was far more interested in getting the fender smoothly shaped.
“Well, I just thought you might be interested, what with the order of the universe being disrupted and all,” Scroat said.
“Nope. Let me know when it becomes something I need to worry about,” Hep said. He grabbed a small ball-peen hammer and set to work getting the dimple in the fender taken care of.
“OK then,” Scroat said. “Have fun out here.”
“Yep,” Hep said, already engrossed in his work.
Scroat walked back to the house. For his part, Scroat was interested in how he could work this situation to his advantage. He might be able to get Sarah back. After all, she was just as immortal as him now. So there was nothing keeping them apart!
Scroat went inside and tried to figure out the best way to approach Sarah about resuming their relationship.
#
On Sunday morning at nine o’clock, Father David Adamson was still trying to decide how to start his sermon. He could clearly hear the organist wrapping up a fugue by J.S. Bach, but he didn’t notice how much the sound seemed to reverberate out in the main hall. He gathered up his notes and made his way to the altar entrance. When the organist had finished the piece’s dramatic ending, Father Adamson stepped out of the doorway and began walking to his podium.
It was then he noticed there was only one person, besides himself and the organist in the church. He blinked a few times in surprise, and laughed nervously. He walked down to the one other person, a man who looked to be in his seventies, sitting alone in the middle of a pew in the middle of the church.
“Hello,” Father Adamson said. He did not recognize this man, and was certain he was not a member of the congregation. The old man wore gray slacks, a white shirt with no tie, and a navy blue jacket.
“Hello, Father,” the man said.
“What is your name, my son?” Father Adamson said.
“Bill Tarbox,” the man said. His voice was quiet, but rough from a lifetime of hard liquor and smoking. He held out his hand to Father Adamson. “Pleasure to meet you.”
Father Adamson took his hand and shook it. The old man’s grip was surprisingly strong.
“I’m pleased to meet you as well. I’m Father Adamson.”
Father Adamson looked around at the empty church. It was still just the two of them, and the organist (who was paid by the service, so he knew why the organist had shown up).
“It seems we’re the only ones here today. Anything you want to talk about, Bill?”
“Not as such. I just came in here to have a quiet place to think.”
“Ah. What’s on your mind, then?”
“Well, I was thinking. If there’s no death any more, there’s really no reason to be afraid of Hell. And we certainly won’t be going to Heaven. So apart from my generally held belief that I should not do anything that will harm other people, I can sin away! There’s nothing to worry about.”
“Hmm,” Father Adamson said. “But what if this situation is all just a fluke of some kind? What if people are going to die again. What if you die before you’ve had time to repent? It seems to me a life of virtue and worship is still in order.”
Bill considered this for a moment, then looked squarely at Father Adamson.
“I’ll tell you what, Father. I’ve been here on Earth for close to seventy four years, and if I’ve learned anything in that time, it’s that God doesn’t give a shit what happens down here. Terrible things happen to good people, wonderful things happen to terrible people. He doesn’t get involved, just sits in judgement. If he even does that much. Every day, science explains a little more of our world, and I start to wonder if there’s really anything I can do that is so terrible I’d deserve an eternity of punishment. And you know, I think that there really isn’t anything that bad. And how is it that people who never knew the Word of God are damned, anyway? So, I say, if the scientists and experts say we aren’t dying anymore, then I’m going to side with them, because God sure doesn’t seem to be on my side. ”
Father Adamson was aghast.
“Well, if that’s how you feel, why come to a church? Why not a bar, or a strip club, or an alley?”
“I’ve been to those places. They’re all loud, or smelly, or, uh, distracting. So I thought about it, and I figured that the one place no one else would be on a Sunday morning was church.”
“OK. So why not simply stay home? You must have had a reason to come here.”
“As a matter of fact, I do. I figured if no one was going to church anymore, you’d probably had a good supply of wine on hand that isn’t going to any particular use, and I’m an old man with not much savings. I can’t be blowing my money on booze. So, I came here. Want to get fucked up?”
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