by Cobyboy
"Sorry about that," said Satan, with an exaggerated and childish note of pity in his horrifying voice. "That table's a bit funny. You really have to use some force."
I gripped the top of one knight and was able to pick it up only with a notable exertion. It was as though they were being held to the table by strong magnets. Already I was very annoyed. In a game of chess, the act of physically moving each piece should never be the hard part. It should be effortless.
Just to spite the Devil, I took my time in fixing all the pieces. Getting them straight and organized. Making sure the slashes on top of each bishop were on the right side.
"Ready?" the Devil asked. Like an impatient child, he was lingering just beyond the threshold and swinging the door in and out. I felt a current of air washing over me.
"Sure," I said.
He smiled and, with no further ado, stepped further into the hall and slammed the door shut. The sound echoed through my tomb, sealing my fate.
I wasn't worried. Not at all. The Devil wanted me to scream, so I was going to scream. I would scream my damn head off. Of course I would wait a suitable amount of time, to make it seem like I had endured and finally been broken by whatever torture he had devised for me. But could he really break me? Of course not. Just like he couldn't really beat me in chess.
Just as he had said, it began as soon as the door was shut.
First, I noticed that the wax statue of Mahendra looked different. The light fell over it differently. More realistically. Then I noticed it was breathing. With a great gulp of air, Mahendra came to life and stepped out of the alcove, spluttering and gasping like he had been holding his breath underwater for a long time.
I looked around, at the other statues. Were they all alive, held motionless under a thin layer of... something? Were they frozen by some magic spell? I wanted to get up and save them, rip that layer of wax from their mouths so they could breathe. But, just like in a nightmare, I discovered that my body was so heavy that I just couldn't get up.
"You," Mahendra said, staring at me with watery eyes. "It's all your fault. I shouldn't be here. I was supposed to be in Heaven. Wasn't it bad enough that I was cursed to live forever? Did you really have to drag me down to Hell with you?"
I realized, feeling quite guilty, that I hadn't been around to see Mahendra as often as I had promised. I should have visited him more often. That's what a real friend would have done.
As I had these thoughts, I noticed a thrum of nervous energy in my chest. My anxiety level was rising. It was a rare feeling for me, and highly unpleasant.
This was Hell. A torture room designed just for me. And I was letting it work. I started to calm down, realizing the truth.
"You're not the real Mahendra," I said.
"No?" Mahendra rubbed his chin. "Don't believe it? Well, the real Mahendra is great at chess. You know that. He's had almost as much time to perfect his skills as you. Maybe if I sit down in that chair and kick your ass, you'll believe me."
He stormed over, stomping his feet with every stride, and fell into the chair opposite me. With no effort at all, he picked up his first piece and moved it. Where was that magnet effect for him? It didn't exist. Meanwhile, I was stuck in the slow molasses of a nightmare, my movements sluggish and weak. I was barely able to grip a piece. Moving it took forever. My anxiety level rose further, despite all the logical thoughts that were trying to tell it not to.
"I'm sorry, Mahendra," I said. "Wait, why am I apologizing? You're a fake. Just an illusion by the Devil..."
"Am I?" Mahendra replied venomously. "That's just like you, Death. Trying to explain everything away. Trying to avoid all your responsibilities as a supposed friend. Let's just play, and you'll soon find out how real I am."
We played. And you will be very unsurprised to hear that he beat me. But I was also unsurprised. This was a simulated reality, designed and run by the Devil. It could read my thoughts, understand my moves, and instruct its fake Mahendra to play well against them. Just like the computer, Mahendra was able to come up with the best possible move to counter everything I did.
I would like to say the game was at least close, but it wasn't. He stomped me. Still, I wasn't concerned. I took my ego, set it aside for now, and just watched everything impartially, as though it were all happening to someone else.
Despite my best efforts, I wasn't able to turn off my brain completely. I couldn't help but notice that Mahendra's moves and actions seemed... organic. They did not really feel like the robotically perfect moves of a computer. His tactics were emotional, fed by a human desire for victory. That was unmistakable. And it started to shake me.
"How about that?" Mahendra asked upon winning, taking my king and flinging it into some distant corner of the room. "How's that for proof? I'm better than you, now. The apprentice becomes the master! How do you like that, friend?"
I shrugged my shoulders. "It is what it is."
"Oh?" He leaned over the table, glaring at me. "Is that all you can say? This is all your fault, you jerk. I shouldn't be here!"
Behind him, the door to the hall burst open. For a moment I felt relieved. Perhaps my driver friend was here to rescue me, or else Satan had experienced a change of heart. Hell, I even would have welcomed Zanus at that point.
Instead, a few lesser demons scurried in. The largest of them was holding a pitchfork. As soon as Mahendra stood up, the demon stabbed the fork through his chest. Mahendra began spluttering again, spitting up blood and wailing in agony, as the demons carried him out of the room amid cheers and laughter.
The door shut. I was still here, still rooted to my chair by a nightmarish weight. It was not over. And now the board, and my face, were flecked with Mahendra's blood.
As I sat and tried to recover from my shock, Alfred of Wessex stirred to life and fell flat on the floor, coughing and wheezing like he had finally escaped from being strangled.
"Death," he said quietly, in a choked voice. He was staring at me with his sad brown eyes. "I was hoping I would see you again. But not like this."
"Not like this," I agreed. Never like this.
Alfred dragged himself across the floor and used the empty chair as a ladder to get back to his feet. He sat down, sagging like an old man at the end of a long day, and let his head fall back.
"Why are you here?" he asked, staring up at the ceiling.
I didn't answer. I couldn't think of what to say.
"You're here to fetch a poor, misjudged soul back to the Kingdom of Heaven," Alfred continued. "Lucky for that soul, you were paying attention. But for selfish reasons. You don't care about that man. You only wanted to get down here for a good game of chess. And look where it got you. Serves you right."
"Alfred," I said, taken aback. "Why are you angry with me? I thought..."
He brought his head forward and stared at me. A vein now stood out in his forehead, pulsing angrily. "You thought what, Death? That we were kindred souls, two fellows bonding over a game of chess? Where were you when I was judged, and sent to Hell instead of Heaven? No one ever came to get me. Where were you, then?"
I closed my eyes, and felt a small tear escape. "I didn't know. I never heard anything about it. I would have... I just assumed..."
"You assumed? That only makes an 'ass' out of 'u' and 'me.' There's a saying I've heard since getting sent down here and I'm rather fond of it. It applies perfectly to this situation. You were an ass for letting me suffer all these centuries. Didn't I suffer enough while I was alive? And I... I was an ass for ever 'assuming' that you were anything but a selfish wretch."
He slammed his fist onto the table, making the pieces jump. Then he began setting them up, putting them all on their proper squares. When it came time to find my king, he started looking around the room.
"The king is gone," he said. "The king is in Hell, flung away from his rightful place. And it's all your doing, Death. Ah, there he is..."
He got up and, with greater strength than he displayed before, strode over to grab the ki
ng out of the corner. The ivory was a little scuffed, but still beautiful.
"Let's play a round, shall we?" Alfred said.
And so we played. And so he won. And on it went, each of my memorable opponents coming to life, chastising me in their own specific way, making me feel terrible, forcing me closer and closer to total panic. Each playing a game against me, winning, being skewered and removed from the room...
Looking back now, I see how melodramatic and theatrical it all was. But, like a dream, you don't necessarily realize it's ridiculous while you're still in the middle of it.
After the final round, as I watched the wonderfully talented Charlie Chaplin turned into a shish kabob by a grinning demon, I finally cracked. And you better believe I screamed. At first I yelled for the demon to let the man go. Then I screamed for Satan to come let me out, on the off chance he was close enough to hear. Then, hearing the fear and lunacy in my own voice, I just screamed. A wordless, primal sound, turning my throat raw and echoing far across Hell.
And then it was over. The chess set disappeared, as did the chair under me, and I was suddenly on the floor in a dark room where I saw and heard nothing. Tears poured out of my eyes as I gibbered like a madman. I had been broken. My mind had failed me, all my logic and strategy and forward thinking. All of them had disappeared when I most needed them.
I remember little of my trip back to Heaven, except that Satan had the common courtesy to escort me as far as the top of the hole in Siberia.
11
I could have lingered in Heaven a while, sipping wine and relaxing and trying to recover from my ordeal. But that was the last thing I wanted to do. I was restless.
As soon as a reaping came in, before any denizen of Heaven had a chance to even look at me, I was off. Back to Earth, swooping down through the sky and flying between the skyscrapers of a huge western metropolis. It was America, the USA in the year 2079. Recognizable only by the star-spangled banner that still flew in ridiculous and almost pathological quantities all over.
It's good to know that some things never change.
I put my mind into my work. Feeling the cold air of that wintry city rushing through my cloak, I could almost smell the stink of Hell washing off of me like water from a duck's back. I shook my head, dispelling dark thoughts, and finally swept in to land at the front doors of a hospital. If it had been a nice day, all the windows might have been open. Alas, I would have to take the slow way up.
The patient in question resided in a rather high-tech area of the hospital, in a private room. I entered without knocking, melting through the closed door. I was all business, all professional, ready to get my daily reapings underway and put as much distance between me and Hell as possible.
The woman in the bed was not very old, but her condition caused her to look somewhat ancient. She had very little hair, just a wisp of colorless fluff. Her eyebrows were almost entirely gone. Her blue eyes, glazed and lightless, were sunken back into her skull. She was emaciated, wasted away; her skin seemed to be paper thin. The room was set very warm, but still she was underneath several blankets. She certainly did not look like she was long for this world. No surprise that I was here to end her suffering.
I came to her bedside, feeling strangely tender and sad after my time in Hell. I became visible, taking her fragile hand in mine and trying to give it some of my own warmth.
"Death," she said, her voice so small and weak. "Is it finally time? Oh, who am I kidding. I'm never that lucky."
She smiled to herself, and shook my hand off of her.
"I'm fine," she said. "I get enough pity from the people who work here. And from myself, too."
She blinked a few times, slowly, and finally got a good look at my pale face.
"Who are you?" she asked. Then, shaking her head, she laughed. "Sorry, I'm not usually this rude to guests. If anyone wants to come in here to see a dying lady, I'll gladly have them. It's good to meet you, whoever you are. I guess we already shook hands... sort of."
I nodded, looking around. She apparently got a lot of visitors, because the room was full of flowers and balloons. Right away I noticed a chess set, brand new in a box, unopened, with a little card propped on top. I could read the writing inside from where I stood: To dearest Lydia, I hope for a speedy recovery and a return to your most beloved world of chess.
It seemed this was fate. Well, of course it was. Everything is.
"Lydia?" I asked.
She nodded. "Don't you know me? It's fine if you don't. I'm just surprised. Not because I'm famous, because I'm really not... It's just that people don't usually visit people if they don't even know their names!"
She started coughing. Getting too excited for her current weakened state. I reached out to offer some sort of assistance, but I saw the proud and independent glow in her eye and thought better of it. If I started getting too overbearing, she might make me regret it.
I decided that she deserved for this to be as easy and painless as possible.
"I have some news," I said.
"Good or bad?" she asked.
"Depends on your views."
"Well... should I tell you my views? Everyone is wanting me to get better. I think a lot of them actually expect me to. They have some image of me as this wonderfully strong, invincible woman. And with modern medicine, they think my recovery's already a foregone conclusion. In half a year, they think I'll be back in the tournaments. Making my comeback. But it's just not true. I'm dying. I know I am. I'm only getting worse every day, not better. And I can feel that I don't have much time left."
I smiled. "On the bright side, you are completely right. You have very little time at all. I am Death, and I'm here to send you to the afterlife."
She did something I have never seen before. She laughed and slapped her knee, like I had just told an incredible joke.
"I knew it!" she cried. "I should have trusted my first instinct. You're the damn Grim Reaper, you son of a bitch! Hah! Where's your scythe?"
I shook my head. "Everyone always wants me to have a scythe! Sorry, but I've never had one. And I never will, unless I need to harvest some wheat or something."
"My granddaddy used a scythe to cut his grass," she said. "He had a very small yard, though."
And just like that she was off in her own world, staring toward the window where a bleak winter sun shone through.
"I'm afraid I have to take you away from all this," I said, trying to get her attention back.
"I understand," she said. "I'm ready to go. I'm sick of being in pain. But... I would just love to play one last game of chess. This game has been my one true love, my purpose for being alive... Ever since I was four years old, I have not gone a day without playing. I have kept a book of chess moves in my pocket since the age of ten. I have spent every free moment practicing... It would be wrong to break the pattern now. How about it?"
"It would be wrong not to," I agreed. I tried to remain courteous, cool, professional, but inside I was excited. I was glad to be finding a game of chess so soon. After what happened in Hell, I felt the need to prove to myself that I was still good at it.
"There's a set in the recreation room down the hall," she said, "but I think for our purposes we ought to stay put. Go ahead and open that box."
I went to the unopened set and peeled the shrink-wrap away. It was a basic set, cheap and portable, but it would do just fine.
Lydia sat up, drawing her legs up under her, giving me room to set up the game at the foot of the bed.
"I appreciate this," she said. "It's always been my goal; chess as the last thing I did before death. It always seemed like the right thing to do. It always seemed... perfect."
"I'm glad to oblige," I told her.
We began to play, and right away I knew it would be a good game. She played as effortlessly as I did. Perhaps more so. Each move she made was perfect, and she was talking all the while, paying only half attention.
"I was already getting sick the last championship I played," she told
me. "I was able to win, just barely. If I had lost, I would have been right there to play in the next one no matter how bad my health was." She laughed, shaking her head, as she casually captured one of my rooks. "The man I played with in the final bout... such an incredible player. Almost supernatural. If I was the suspicious type, I would have said he was cheating. I might still have said that, if I lost. His name was Stefan..."
I really wanted to listen. She was confiding in me, her final spectator, telling me the condensed version of her life and the reasons she got out of bed each morning, when she was still capable of doing so. It seemed she had packed a thousand years of chess into her human lifespan, cut short by the terrible disease that ravaged her, such a horrible beast that even modern medicine in the year 2079 couldn't quite tame it.
But I could only allow myself to pay attention to small pieces of what she was telling me. The rest of my concentration was focused on the game. To her this was just casual fun, a way to cap off her life. To me, it was the most important game of my entire existence. It was the game which I was using to bring myself back from insanity. And... I was losing.
How could it be? How could it be?
Had humanity really progressed so much in their knowledge of chess? Was my confidence just ruined from my experience in Hell? Was I having trouble concentrating, my thoughts going a million different directions at once?
Probably all of the above were true. It was a perfect storm of crap that was leading me down the road to defeat. Like the chain of events and bad decisions that led to the Titanic disaster, I was falling prey to an inescapable conclusion.
Perhaps I was fated to lose this match. Perhaps it was all part of the plan. But I still feel like I should have been able to win. It would be easy just to say I wasn't playing seriously, that I was scatterbrained, that it was barely even me sitting on that bed that day. But in reality, I was focused more than I had been in centuries. I was trying harder, playing with greater attention, thinking with more concentrated power...
