Friday, November 20, 2009

Chapter Twenty Two

Death is a debt we all must pay - Euripides






Chapter 22


Death was laying in bed listening to The Cure with the covers over her head. The box of chicken fried rice after all the sweet and sour pork had probably been a bad idea. Especially since she had a pint of ice cream afterwards She groaned and rolled on to her side, which was slightly more comfortable in that she could breathe without excessive effort than laying on her back. Laying on her stomach just didn’t work.


For the last six months, Death had stayed in her room eating, pitying herself, listening to sad songs, and writing horrendous poetry and posting it on the internet. That’s what she did on the days when she was somewhat motivated, anyhow. On days like today, she just stayed in bed and ordered takeout.


She had actually planned quite a day of laying in bed. alternating between having the covers over her head and staring hopelessly at the ceiling. Her existence was just so completely without meaning, it took all the energy she could muster to simply keep her eyes open.


As she laid on her side, she’d started mentally composing a new poem, but had only gotten as far as “I can decide your ultimate fate/but have no control over my own” when she heard a thump that shook the floor and an agonized groan in her room. It sounded like it had come from the foot of her bed.


“Who’s there?” Death moaned as though the very effort of speaking might cause lasting damage to her psyche.


Another horrendous groan came from the floor.


“Go away,” Death said.


“Oh, my head,” someone in her room said. She heard small thumping noises. Her depression could not overcome her curiousity, and she poked her head out from under the covers and sat up in bed to see who was there. She kept the covers wrapped around her shoulders.


On the floor at the foot of her bed was a large, incredibly ugly man with misshapen legs. He was clutching his head and had a look of utter agony on his face.


“Are you OK?” she asked this mysteriously appearing, ugly man.


“Uh uh,” Hep groaned. He continued thumping his head against the floor.


“Is that actually helping, or are you just doing it to annoy me?” Death asked.


Hep opened one eye and glared at her. “Man that hurts,” he said. After a few minutes he composed himself and sat up.


“So, who are you?” Death asked.

“Hephaistos. Hep to my friends,” Hep said. He climbed up off of the floor and sat down in the chair at Death’s desk.


“And, how come you appeared here, of all places, in agonizing pain?”


“I needed to get here quickly, and I wasn’t sure of your street address. I get the worst hangover when I travel by thought.”


“Really? Why’s that?”


“I don’t know. I guess I’m just not meant for it,” Hep said.


“I see,” Death said. They sat quietly for a moment, until Death asked, “So why did you come to see me?”


“Because nobody is dying. Which, by the way, is completely OK with me. If you want to take a break, I’m not going to stop you. Except my buddy Ares is getting all mixed up in the head. The other day, he was wearing a shirt with,” Hep paused and shuddered, “dancing teddy bears on it.”

“And this was caused by me... how?” Death asked.


“Well, you know who Ares is, right? God of War? Well, since people stopped dying, every government in the world decided that right now would be a great time to invade whatever country they wanted to invade. That would work out just great for Ares, except no one actually died. There’s just a lot of explosions and rubble and soldiers with big holes in them walking around. I think the frustration caused him to have a nervous breakdown,” Hep said.


“A nervous breakdown?” Death said.


“Yeah, or something. Ares has become a filthy hippie.”


“And so what do you want me to do about it?”


“Well, if you could go back to work, that’d be great,” Hep said.


“There’s no point. I don’t want to,” Death said, and flopped back onto her bed.


“Why not?” Hep asked. He was accustomed to petty behavior from other gods, but was still mildly surprised every time he witnessed it.


“Because. I’ll never be done. I have no great work. Just a lot of stupid little tasks to be done. It’s all busywork, and it will never end.”


“Well,” Hep started. He tried to think of something motivating, something inspiring to get her out of her rut and back into the swing of things. “It sounds to me like you’re just having a little pity party in here when you ought to be out doing your damn job.”


Death sat straight up in her bed then, furious, and the covers fell away from her. She was wearing a black cotton tank top and little else. Since she’d had time to eat over the last six months, her previously skeletal figure was now wonderfully woman-shaped. Hep swallowed and tried not to ogle her, with little success.


“Look buddy, last I heard, you haven’t done your job for a couple thousand years, so you’re not one to talk. You don’t know what my existence is like, so fuck you. You got it?”


“OK, you’re too depressed to do your job. No need to lash out at me,” Hep said.


“Fine,” Death said. She noticed she was slightly more exposed than she would like to be, and pulled the blanket around her waist.


“Of course, we still need to come up with a solution to the problem of all these newly immortal mortals. We’re going to have to restore the natural order some how,” Hep said.


“Well, figure something out,” Death said. “I’m staying here.”


“Right,” Hep said. “Of course, the problem there is that you are Death, and no one else is.”


“Bug Thanatos,” Death said.


“No one even knows where he is, and he’s been out of work longer than I have,” Hep said.


“Well, how about Osiris or Anubis?”


“They do a totally different job than you,” Hep said.


“The Morrigan, then,” Death said, getting frustrated.


“Oh, come on. Even you know that’s just a bad idea,” Hep said. He was rapidly becoming exasperated.


“Fine. You do it then,” Death said.


Hep laughed out loud.


“Me? Now you’re being ridiculous,” Hep said.


“No. I give unto you my powers and responsibilities, at least until I’m feeling better,” Death said.


“Wait, no, I can’t do your job. I’m a blacksmith. I can’t even teleport without an agonizing migraine crippling me. How am I supposed to keep up with your job?”


“I don’t really care,” Death said. “Have fun. I recommend the cheap stopwatches you can get at dollar stores and good liquid ink ball point pens from an office store. Now get out of here.”


Death waved her hand dismissively and Hep found himself back in his own living room. He was amazed he didn’t have another headache.


“Maybe I can do this job,” Hep said to himself.


Scroat came in to the room then.

“So how did it go?” Scroat asked him.


“Unexpectedly. But I think I’ve got a plan for how to cure Ares,” Hep said.

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