Scythe Does Matter

With grim determination and a little help from Shannon, I managed to haul myself up. It was a short distance from where I swayed to where Conrad stood, wielding the stapler. With every bit of strength and willpower I possessed, I put one foot in front of the other. I moved like a zombie—dead gal walking—but I moved.

“Don’t come any closer, Kirsty. I swear I’ll brain you.”

“Do it, Conrad. You took my life from me once with that skeggin’ stapler. Go ahead and do it again. I dare you!”

I lurched another step toward him. I glanced behind me, where Shannon stood frozen, her eyes wide with fear.

“I love you, Shannon. You’ve always been a great friend to me. Like the sister I never had.”

Only a few steps remained. It was more than I could manage with my wasted muscles and weakened lungs. “Go ahead. Make my day,” I said to Conrad. I threw myself the remaining distance, more falling at him than tackling.

A moment’s hesitation, then bam! I heard more than felt, the sound of the heavy metal stapler crashing into my skull.

Bam! Bam! Crunch!

Shannon wailed.

Maybe I did, too.

While having one’s skull pounded like an old stump makes a distinct sound, it wasn’t enough to alert anyone outside this room. No nurse or doctor would come running and save me.

Then the pain slammed into me. My head throbbed like nothing I’d ever experienced before—not even when a five-hundred-pound air-conditioning unit had squashed me like a bug. I cried out, screaming in pain and fury.

Conrad hit me again—bam!

The pain was so great I couldn’t breathe, and that felt very different now that breathing was important to me again. I shuddered, slithering back down to the icy-cold floor. I realized I was counting, getting slower and slower.

Well, you can’t blame a gal for dying.

Everything went black . . . and then my soul sprang free. Half-naked, pale and saggy Kirsty lay on the floor, one side of her poor shaved head a different shape from the other. At last, I was really dead. I glanced down at myself—the spirit version of me—to see I sported the same fit body and kick-ass outfit I’d worn to my graduation.

“Bastard!” Shannon smashed a bedpan (empty, thankfully) on Conrad’s wrist. He dropped the stapler onto the bed with a howl. It bounced once, the impact causing it to open like a great, gaping mouth. It left a gory outline in red smears and gray bits.

Shannon reached for it, keeping her eyes on her father.

“No, don’t!” I screamed, not wanting her to get fingerprints on the blunt instrument that had orchestrated my final demise. But she couldn’t hear me anymore.

She wrapped her fingers around the black metal, ready to defend herself with Conrad’s weapon of choice. Why couldn’t he have used a gun like a normal person?

I heard another bam! Not like a stapler hitting a skull, but sort of a whoosh-bam. Where had I heard that before?

“You murdering bastard!” Shannon yelled, hands spasming on the stapler. “You did this. All this time I thought you cared about her. You killed my best friend. First you stole her life and then you killed her.”

Ah, now she believed me.

“Yes, I did. Just as she says. But sweetheart, I did it for you. I did everything for you.”

The whoosh-bam sound echoed again, just behind me, but I kept my attention on the family feud.

Conrad turned to me, eyes narrowed. “You! No. I’ve got something to offer. Let’s talk!” For a moment I thought he could see me, but he was looking over my shoulder. I spun around. Dante stood behind me in all his Reaper glory, the way I’d first seen him. His robe billowed out behind him, eyes furious, expression dark and grim.

I sagged with relief. I’d been expecting him. What I hadn’t expected was for him to be flanked by Sergeant Schotz and Judge Julius.

“Well?” Dante asked, half turning toward his escort.

“I’ve seen enough. His confession will stand.” The judge nodded, bad hairpiece flapping up and down with the movement.

“Thank you, Judge. And Sergeant, because that proves I mistakenly reaped Kirsty before her time, I know you’ll be confiscating my scythe again and sending me back to the Mortal Coil. I’ll turn myself in as soon as—”

“Forget that, Reaper Alighieri. It’s obvious this creep tricked you, so I’m lettin’ it slide.”

“But, sir. I—”

Judge Julius cut in. “You’re arguing with your boss, Dante? Don’t look a gift scythe in the mouth. This is Hell. We play favorites.” He opened his own mouth, fluorescent light glinting off his demonic fangs. “Besides, I had to study your poems in school. For that cruel and unusual punishment, you belong in Hell.” He raised his gavel and whoosh-bammed away.

Sergeant Schotz nodded, lowering his gaze to stare grimly at my half-naked body lying on the floor.

I moved to try to cover myself, but my hand passed right through the blue gown and my own chest. Dante quickly moved in to cover it for me, succeeding where I had failed. I needed to learn that trick.

“Too bad,” Sergeant Schotz said. “ ’Fraid you can’t get your old life back now.” He nudged my shoulder with his foot, causing my arm to flop once.

Shannon squealed. What had it looked like to her? Zombie Kirsty rising from the walking dead?

The sergeant lowered his head. When he raised it again, Professor Schotz looked at me, face crumpled with commiseration. “But at least you’ve cleared your name. Both of you. And you, Kirsty, have a good job and a good afterlife waiting for you back home.”

Home. Yes, sir. That was where I was going. But I had one more thing to take care of first.

The whoosh-bam sounded once more, judge and professor transporting away.

Dante nodded to me gravely. He raised his scythe handle to shoulder height, ready to activate it. “Conrad Iver. You sold your soul, and I have come to collect.” He coughed. “I hath come to collecteth thine soul, I mean.”

He activated his scythe. The two purple lights shot out, up and down from the handle, the top one arcing out to form the blade. You have to admit, it’s pretty impressive. I couldn’t wait to try my own.

“I can still make it worth your while. I can get you other souls. Not just one or two. I can get you as many as you need. What’s your weekly quota?” Conrad weaseled and wheedled, turning my stomach with every whiny word. “I’ve got some homeless folk lined up who think they’re giving blood.”

And then he laughed. Not the evil-villain “Bwahahaha!” that I expected. No, this was a little friendly chuckle, like an in-joke shared between old friends.

That was it. The last straw. My blood simultaneously ran cold and boiled. Above Dante’s head, the clock ticked. Only seconds remained in the anniversary hour. My old body had been weak and useless, but my Hell body was in great shape. I leapt across the room—charging right through the hospital bed—and snatched the scythe right out of Dante’s hand.

Before Dante even had a chance to scream, “Don’t touch my scythe,” I’d whipped around and sliced it through Conrad’s body.

“I’ll see you in Hell, you skeg-hole!”

Conrad’s eyes flew wide and his red face grew redder. Staggering backward, he crashed into equipment, falling to the floor, clutching his chest. Shannon dropped the stapler and rushed out the door, screaming for help.

In seconds, the room was a hive of medical personnel shouting things like “stat!” and “clear.”

“Oops,” I said, retracting the scythe and handing it back to Dante. “I think this is yours.”