It's a Wonderful Death - Sarah J. Schmitt Page 0,2
I say, no longer able to hide my desperation and clutching onto his arm. “I’ve gotta go back. There is no way I am going to let Felicity steal my crown. That backstabber is probably on her way to get her fat head measured.”
“Would you just relax?” he hisses before yanking his cloak out of my grasp and turning away from me.
I sink into a seat. Relax? Is he insane? How can I relax when I’m … when I’m dead? And then it hits me like a ton of bricks. I’m really freaking dead. My head drops to my waiting hands and I feel my last breath leave my body as cold overtakes me. I struggle to keep my brain from accepting what’s happening. If I deny it, it’s not real. And this can’t be real. My life was, no, is just starting. This isn’t right. It isn’t fair. I just can’t be … dead.
Chapter 2
The doors open again and the Reapers hustle everyone into an empty terminal. Everyone but me, that is. I refuse to move. What if I get off this train and can never go back? Nope. I’ll stay here until the train makes the return trip, get off, and stay.
“Get up,” Gideon commands.
I ignore him. Why should I make this easy?
“I’m not kidding,” he says. “I have a schedule to keep.”
This gets me to look at him. “Yeah? Well, so did I. How does it feel to have things not work out the way you plan?”
He leans on his scythe. “Listen, kid, I don’t know how many different ways I can tell you that there’s nothing I can do to fix your situation.”
“That’s fine,” I answer. “I’ll just take the return trip and you can get back to me once you’ve figured things out.”
“It doesn’t work that way. There is no return passage. One way. This can only be sorted out if you stand up, shuffle through the doors, and head to processing like everyone else. That’s the way it works.”
I love how he’s still acting like he’s completely innocent in my predicament. But if he’s telling the truth, sitting on the train isn’t going to change anything. I might be passive aggressive, but I’m not stupid. “So is there someone in processing who can help me?”
“They’ll know what to do better than I would. I’m sure this has happened before.”
“Just not to you,” I say with a smirk.
He nods. “Right.”
I stand up, reluctantly, and follow him out of the car and down the short terminal that connects to a long hallway. From the ceiling to the floor, the passage is white marble. It’s like walking into a really bright mausoleum. Which is creepy enough, but adding to the shiver-up-my-spine factor is that I can’t hear anything. Not the echo of my footsteps, not even the sound of the train as it hurries off to its next destination. It is complete and utter silence. I can’t even hear the sound of my heartbeat. Like my lungs, it probably doesn’t work anymore.
I clear my throat just to make sure my ears still work. The Reaper’s head snaps toward me.
“Sorry,” I say. Wait a minute. Did I just apologize to him? What is wrong with me? RJ Jones does not apologize to anyone. Not ever. And why do I owe Grim Boy anything? This is his fault. On the plus side, I can still talk. “What happens in processing?” I ask.
He looks at me with contempt. “You get processed,” he answers, very slowly, like he’s convinced I don’t understand the words I’m saying.
I glare at him with as much hatred as I can muster, which, given the circumstance, is pretty substantial. “That much I figured out on my own, thank you. I mean, what does processing entail?”
He sighs. “It’s where they check you in and give you the recording of your life.”
“You mean like a DVD?”
“Actually, they use laser discs up here.”
“Laser what?”
The Reaper gives me a look of exasperation. “You never stop asking questions, do you? Think of it like this: if an album and DVD had a baby, it would look like a laser disc. It’s a failed technology experiment from the nineteen eighties and nineties.”
“Album?” I ask.
“You don’t know what an album is?”
In spite of everything, I’m having a good time watching him get flustered by my random questions. It’s one of many weapons in my verbal arsenal. “Relax, I know what it is. I saw one in a museum once.”