I’ll sleep when I’m dead - Warren Zevon

  When was the last time I had such a good sleep? I wondered, my mind lazy and at ease.

  I didn’t know, and I hummed contentedly to myself, sinking deeper into the restful nothingness surrounding me. But then I realized that the amount of sleep I was getting was entirely too suspicious, and I shot upward.

  Well, I tried to, but I didn’t so much as get an inch before realizing that I couldn’t really move at all, like I was wearing the world’s most intense weighted blanket.

  That was enough to have my eyes snapping open, but I stayed still. If I was in a dangerous situation, I wanted as much time to observe as possible before I was noticed.

  Oh, who was I kidding? Three ghost fighters who might be ghosts themselves had knocked me out and kidnapped me. It was hard to imagine what might be a more dangerous situation than that. Especially since they had dispatched that Phantasm so easily.

  I took a deep calming breath, trying to center myself. That was when I began to hear voices over my own racing heartbeat.

  “Look, it’s obvious that she’s a Reaper.”

  “How is that in any way obvious? She’s not registered anywhere, and no one knows her. She didn’t even know who or what we were when she saw us!”

  The voices were in the room with me, but it was large enough that I could tell they were still several feet away from me. One of the voices sounded much more heated than the other, which was probably why they hadn’t noticed my rather abrupt rise to consciousness.

  “So, she’s fallen through the cracks somehow. Not exactly the world’s first clerical error.”

  “Clerical error! Gods, can you take anything seriously? Maybe there’s the occasional error in soul shuffling or a mixing up of existing Reapers, but the idea that one of us could be created with no record or training or even knowledge is insane!”

  Hey, I had knowledge! Granted, it was very little considering that the voice in my head had gone silent, but still, I had some knowledge.

  “You seem awfully worked up about this.”

  “Because this clearly has to be some sort of aberration or even a plan by the enemy!”

  “The enemy, really? And who would that be, exactly?”

  “I . . .”

  As amusing as the back-and-forth was, my curiosity was too great to just keep quiet. One of my many character flaws. Turning my head, I finally allowed myself to look at the people standing on the other side of the room, discussing me like I wasn’t a living, breathing person that they had just kidnapped.

  They . . . weren’t what I expected.

  Three figures, one I recognized as the apparent ringleader who flicked me in the forehead and kidnapped me. Another was a quite short, stocky woman in plain clothes who looked to be younger than me. Definitely a teenager. She had curly red hair, and although I could only see her profile, I could tell she had a round face that emphasized how young she looked. But she certainly didn’t talk like any teenagers I knew. Not that I knew a lot.

  The third figure was . . . interesting, to say the least. Some moments, he looked like he was in his late twenties, but then another, he would age to his early fifties, only to go back again. And yet, if I had to actually point out how he aged and regressed, I couldn’t.

  It wasn’t that he was particularly unusual looking beyond that. He had olive-toned skin along with salt-and-pepper hair and deep, dark eyes that almost seemed like an empty pit of nothingness when the light hit them a certain way. As if that weren’t enough, he was dressed in a very stylish suit that harkened back to the time when pocket watches and vests were the mark of any good businessman.

  Freaky.

  “You know, I’m just as confused as you all are,” I said finally.

  I won’t lie; it was pretty satisfying to see all of them jump. They whirled and glared at me, some of those gazes more malevolent than others.

  “She can’t be awake!” the ringleader said. What was his name again? I couldn’t remember.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  “I dunno, Jamison, she looks pretty awake to me.”

  “Humans can’t be conscious in the land between, Gildebrak! You know that!”

  Ah, Jamison. That was it! But what kind of name was Gildebrak? I didn’t know a single person in existence with a name like that. Maybe she was foreign? But unlike Jamison, she had no accent.

  Curious.

  “I’m well aware of the rules of the Dead Offices. So, if she’s awake, that means she’s not human.”

  “But she’s not a Reaper!”

  “You repeating that assertion doesn’t make it any truer.”

  “Quiet, you two,” the eldest man said before taking a step toward me. “As for you . . .” Those depthless eyes landed on me, and my breath stuttered in my chest for a moment. There was something both deeply unnatural and a bit fascinating about his gaze. “Apologies for your rather rude awakening. If you promise to cooperate, I’d be happy to remove your bonds.”

  “I’d be quite keen on that, if I’m being honest,” I said cheerily. “And I have no intention of making trouble unless you plan on starting trouble with me, sir.”

  “Please, my name is Orson Atwell. Feel free to call me that.”

  “A mere mortal shouldn’t refer to the Lord of the Dead by his given name!” Jamison blurted, sounding utterly horrified. I would have rolled my eyes if I hadn’t become very interested in what the Reaper just said.

  “Lord of the Dead?” I blurted out. Wasn’t he supposed to have horns and a barbed tail or something?

  “Let’s not worry about that for now. First, let’s get you upright and make sure you’re in good order.”

  Well, I couldn’t really argue with his priorities.

  I gave him another nod, and he closed the distance between the two of us, snapping his fingers near every strap, causing them to release me. That explained why there were no buckles. Also, it triple reaffirmed that there was definitely magic going on. Funny that seeing a malicious ghost, being snapped into unconsciousness, and waking up with people debating me being a Reaper wasn’t enough to push me into certainty. Sometimes, it was just the little things.

  Once I was completely free of all of the straps, the man offered me a hand, and I cautiously took it, allowing him to pull me up into a sitting position. I expected to be sore and a bit achy, as I was most mornings, but instead, I was feeling quite refreshed.

  “How long have I been out?” I asked cautiously, thinking about missed shifts and no call no shows. I was not in a position where I could really afford to lose any of my jobs, and I’d fought so hard to get and balance them in the first place.

  “Here? Perhaps ten hours or so.” I paled immediately, and my stomach lurched. Ten hours?! But then my mind clung to that first word he said. Here. Right, I was in . . . what had they called it . . . the Dead Offices? I didn’t know what that meant, but it definitely implied that my home, that Earth was a different place. “But in the Earth realm, perhaps half an hour? Maybe a bit less.”

  Holy guacamole, that was a pretty huge difference! I could sense that my mind wanted to get tripped up in that detail, but I reminded myself that it really wasn’t even the craziest thing that had happened.

  In fact, I supposed it made sense, considering that the gods and monsters both came from other realms, but I thought that those were things us mortals couldn’t traverse to. Then again, I supposedly wasn’t a mortal anymore, was I?

  Huh!

  That was a thought and a half.

  “How are you feeling?” asked the well-dressed gentleman—the apparent Lord of the Dead. His voice sounding genuinely concerned. Which was nice. While that Jamison fellow seemed awful riled up about my presence, this Mr. Atwell seemed a lot more chill.

  “Are you really the King of the Dead?” I blurted without really thinking it through.

  He grimaced, but it didn’t seem directed at me. “Lord of the Dead,” he corrected gently. “And it’s an archaic title left over from ancient tradition. I prefer to be referred to by my name. I did choose it, after all.”

  “And you chose so greatly,” Gildebrak said, practically flouncing to his side. “Very classic selection.” The young girl’s hazel eyes landed on me, and I got the distinct impression that something was very much not as it seemed. I couldn’t say what, but the impression was there, nonetheless.

  “Thank you for your input,” Mr. Atwell said ever so patiently, before those depthless eyes stared deep into mine. “Do you have any questions?”

  “Lots,” I said, rubbing my wrists and expecting some soreness, but they were just as refreshed as the rest of me. Was that an effect of the so-called Dead Office? Perhaps I should ask about it. After all, I’d pretty much been handed the reins for our conversation.

  However, there were a few other things first in line.

  “You mentioned this was the lands between. Am I in some sort of afterlife?”

  “Ah. Not quite. The land between is pretty accurate. Most of the gods’ afterlives exist elsewhere, a part of the mainframe of existence. We are something . . . outside of it.”

  “Huh.” I said, because what else could I reply with? “So, this land between, the Dead Offices, that’s where all you Reapers hang out?”

  The two men looked like they didn’t want to answer, but Gildebrak just hopped up to sit on the table with me, entirely merry. “Shore is! But hey, you wanna give us your side of the story? Might help us explain some other things.”

  Oh. That was a fair request.

  “Look, this might sound crazy, or maybe it doesn’t to you, but I was a normal girl just a bit ago.” I paused, squinting. “Well, relatively normal.” Gildebrak seemed to appreciate that, and I appreciated her all the more for it right back. “But anyway, I was heading home from work when I heard something in an alley. I went to look and found this old lady who was grievously wounded. She was dressed a lot like you two,” I said, gesturing to Jamison and Gildebrak.

  “Now, I know that means she was likely a Reaper, but at the time, I had no clue. I tried to get her help, I really did, but she just grabbed me and started saying all this stuff I couldn’t quite understand.”

  “Couldn’t understand as in it was unintelligible?” the man in the suit asked—I still had a hard time thinking of him as the Lord of the Dead.

  “No, it was intelligible, and it was words that I could understand, but I didn’t really get what she was saying.”

  The scene began to play over in my mind as I told them, and I was surprised by the rush of emotion that went through me. Sure, the whole thing was pretty upsetting, but the feelings suddenly flowing through me were incredibly intense, like I was experiencing my own death.

  “You’re experiencing mine."