Jeremiah pulled the pistol from the would-be leader’s holster and placed the barrel on his temple.
~ V ~
The line of dead soldiers from the Fourth Civil War of the United States of America was tragic in length and scope. In all his previous deaths, Jeremiah had never joined such a long procession. While women were added to the ranks the last time around, the dead here included many more women, and child soldiers.
Jeremiah was still reeling from the revelation that his country had slid into this decay; his heart felt broken by the return of the in-fighting. Deep inside, he wanted to resist Death once more, but he held firm. This was the final straw and he, like Death, kept his word.
Now that Jeremiah was compliant and falling in line, Death was nowhere in sight, presumably at the front of the line, leading the way.
Jeremiah nodded and smiled. “You got me,” he whispered. “I will follow.” Death’s pact resounded in his mind. This time, he remembered every word without assistance:
I shall grant your request
Until you lay down your arms
We will join hands by your behest
When your last battle is done
But Memento Mori.
“Memento Mori,” he said aloud. Never any kind of scholar, especially crap like Latin, he had not known what those two words meant and didn’t ask Death to explain. “Remember your mortality. That’s what it means,” he said. He didn’t care that he talked aloud now. The others must be in their own worlds anyway. “I have no idea how I know that. I just do.”
The procession moved in step now, right feet then left, in a rhythm, a dance, that dance of death Jeremiah had resisted for nearly two centuries. The final dance steps led to the edge of the River Styx.
A chant began, first among the dead up front, then slowly working its way back— five syllables in sync with their marching, the last one drawn out to the meter of two steps.
Memento Mori-ii.
Memento Mori-ii.
Memento Mori-ii.
Jeremiah remained in sync with his fellow pilgrims but increased his stride with each step. He wanted to move closer to the front to see Death. Once there, the familiar mist surrounding them had turned into a dense fog, but he could make out the banks of the river. He realized this was the furthest he had ever traveled towards the afterlife.
Seeing Jeremiah approaching, Death grinned in a fashion more akin to a Halloween cardboard cutout than a fearsome figure in charge of expiration.
“So you are ready, dear boy?”
Jeremiah nodded, half-smiled, at a loss for words for the first time in his exchanges with Death.
“You didn’t know before, did you? Memento Mori.”
“Not a clue.” He laughed. The relief of laughter, the overall sense of a lightness he felt in that moment made him more confident; it was time to let Death have his way.
Jeremiah reached out his hand. Death clasped it firmly.
All the time Jeremiah had bargained for, his quest for valor in battle, a heroic finish to his military career— it all seemed pointless now. Far more courage was needed for this acceptance of the end of life and the confidence to march forward.
* * *
George Wilhite is the author of the horror collections On the Verge of Madness and Silhouette of Darkness, as well as nearly one hundred stories and poems in print or online.
Best Before / Best After
The Shadow of Death
by Paul Kane
You know me… or you think you do.
Nobody knows — or understands — who I really am. How could you? It would blow your tiny little minds. But I’m the shadow that passes over all of you at some point, obliterating life. That’s why you think you can relate to me, but it’s an illusion. Something you tell yourselves to stay sane.
Death comes for us all eventually, you say— like it’s a shared experience. But you enter this world alone, and you go out of it the same way.
It’s a process.
And I take no great pleasure in what I do— it is, simply, my duty. There is no enjoyment. I witness some of you out there ‘taking’ lives deliberately, although how can you, really? Only one of us can truly take life. But the look of satisfaction on your faces, the glee in the eyes as you shoot, stab, bludgeon each other until your hearts beat no more. You think you’re compelled, but you don’t know what real compulsion is. You’re addicted to the high, that’s all. The paltry release of chemicals in your brain.
But to have to do this. That’s what it truly feels like to be me. Yet still there is no appreciation of what I do. Only scorn. You even try to ward me off … creams and surgery to defy ageing, scientific breakthroughs, cloning… None of it will ever work. It… I am inevitability, pure and simple.
Don’t you idiots understand? What I do gives your life meaning. You should be praising, not berating me. Oh, what do I care anyway? I gave up worrying about what you humans think a long time ago, when I was still young. Yes, I had a childhood; not in the way you imagine, but I did. A very lonely one… And it taught me a lot about the world. How it all works, what must be done in order to maintain balance. It’s very complex, you see. Or you probably don’t. Even the most intelligent, those who claim to understand how everything ticks, don’t get it.
The young, the old, the clever and the stupid. Good or evil, I make no distinction. Some I take in batches, others individually. It’s just the way it works.
For example, that apartment block fire a few months ago. I claimed thirty of you that day. Knew each and every one by name, knew their histories: where they worked, or went to school; what they liked to eat; their hobbies. My knowledge goes far beyond that of those boffins I was just talking about. And it’s matched only by my power.
Take young Cheryl and her family (I certainly did). They were sleeping when the flames reached them on the eleventh floor. A single mother, she’d worked long and hard to look after her children— little Harry, five, and his sister Maggie, just three. Cheryl liked to take them to the park on weekends, when she wasn’t working shifts at the café. Liked to push them on the swings. So much hope for the future as she looked on.
Gone now, all of them. Sad but necessary.
The elderly couple on the second floor — Albert and Rita Finnegan, both into their seventies — among the first to pass over, consumed by the fire. Albert was devoted to Rita, and had been looking after her since the first stroke seven years before. But it was growing harder for Albert to cope, with his arthritis. If you’d asked them, they would have said it was a blessing that they went, and that they’d gone together. Because they’d hardly ever spent any time apart since Albert asked for her hand in marriage so long ago.
You see? Balance.
But still you don’t understand. I witness only confusion, fear and — in some cases — anger over what I do. Sometimes I despair. You pray to deities to help you, keep you safe. More fantasies, dreamed up by those who can’t face the truth.
There is only me. I’m the constant. Waiting for the moment I’ll be called on to act. Far from being frightened, you should be glad of this reminder. Yet you vilify me. There are artists’ representations that look nothing like me, intended to shock. They get so much wrong. Some say I’m an angel (just told you, no religion) with wings, some that I’m a skeleton. A knight wearing black armor, riding a dark horse, wielding a sword and cleaving people in two. But am I male, female? Neither? Some even speculate I’m a monster, a giant spider-creature weaving my web of death. No. I am none of these. As I say, you couldn’t possibly comprehend what I am. None of your computers can give you the answer.
And the names! My favorite, I think, is The Reaper. That’s a classic. With my scythe, harvesting souls… Harvesting for what? I don’t particularly want souls and wouldn’t know what to do with them anyway. And I’m not helping to transport them somewhere! For some of yo
u that’s good news (the murderers, preying on the weak), for others that knowledge brings sorrow. But I’m not here to ferry you to paradise, or anywhere else.
Ever looked up the meaning in a dictionary? Reaper? Reaping? It also states ‘to reap the benefit of one’s exertions’. What fucking benefit do you think I get out of all this?
But you could say just as you don’t really understand me, I don’t understand you. Not as such, not anymore. I wouldn’t be able to do this if I did. I must remain impartial, be neither right nor wrong, neither virtuous nor wicked. I’m pure and I’m forever.
Once upon a time, I admit, I thought I was in love with one of you. A girl called Lily, like the flower. Her hair was the color of sunlight, lips like rubies. If I was ever to figure out humanity it would have been through her. She could have been my Rita; I might have been her Albert. But this isn’t a fairy tale, or the movies. I’m not Brad Pitt— she wasn’t fucking Claire Forlani. I knew, deep down, it couldn’t work. For one thing, she didn’t see me. None of you do until it’s too late. I actually allowed her… wanted her to see me. But still she didn’t.
She fell in love with a boy called Thomas who, coincidentally, did look a bit like Pitt.
They’re both long since gone. Not that I took any pleasure from that, either. I’m not allowed the luxury of revenge. Did she even see me at the end of her life? Maybe… it was hard to tell. She was screaming too much.
Lily… like the flower. Like the flower you send to funerals… or is that orchids? Or both? Doesn’t matter. Funerals are usually connected with religion, and that doesn’t factor into the equation.
No God, no Heaven, no Angels. Just me. What I do isn’t pleasant; I make no apologies for that. Why should I— and who should I apologize to? Definitely not you! If you could only see yourselves.
No, I shouldn’t— can’t feel emotion. It was talking about her that did it. Remembering.
Remain neutral. No wavering. Not even when I look into the eyes of someone I take. Not even when I looked into hers…
Oh, you insects make me sick! You’ve no idea of my reach, my abilities. I may not have the luxury of enjoying it, but to snuff out that spark in you so completely — so irretrievably — takes a degree of skill. I am all in that moment, I am everything.
They were blue, her eyes. Like cornflowers.
Why remember that? Why did I start telling you about it? I’ve held my memories in check for so long…
They say that, at the end, your life flashes before your eyes. It doesn’t. Only the important bits. Only the regrets, mistakes and tragedies. The kind of things you people dwell on. The misery.
You really are stunningly ignorant. The number of times I’ve tried to get you to wake up. Like a few days ago, that millionaire injury lawyer, Stoddard. All he’s ever cared about is making money, mainly out of other people’s misfortune. Ever hear the phrase: ‘You can’t take it with you?’ All the stuff you can buy, but you can’t buy more time. Can’t write me a cheque and hope I’ll leave you alone. I tried to explain this as he breathed his last, but he was more worried about his precious fortune in that safe.
“You’re dying,” I said, “and that’s your major concern? Maybe you should be thinking about all you could have done with it to help your fellow man.” Not that I’m the ghost of Jacob Marley or anything. I care even less about his fellow man than he did. It was the principle. All that cash and it hadn’t delivered one day of real delight. He must have known I was coming sometime, but did he enjoy his life more? No. I rest my case, your honour.
Not one precious day, out having a picnic with a loved one. Wasn’t even married. Nobody to hold hands with, to… to…
Memories again. Of the way her dress swished on a summer’s day when she walked. Out in the countryside, laughing. Thomas holding her hand, not me.
Just the important bits. The regrets.
The blood as it splashed on that dress. Red like rubies; like her lips.
You enjoy the way that it feels to end someone’s life. I don’t. I can’t… ever. But it’s what I must do. What I’ve always done. I am the shadow that passes over all of you at some point, obliterating life.
A shadow… like the one I can see right now, moving towards me. But how… how can this—
Red like her lips. Like my hands, back then— and today.
The shadow draws closer. And, unlike you, it does know the truth. It knows who — what — I am. I can’t help laughing, but promptly shut up.
But I’m forever. I am—
No more games, no more charades.
—the withdrawn orphan who dreamed of being something more…
The darkness crosses the room, sweeping the floor of this abandoned warehouse I’ve been forced to flee to. The place they will eventually find me, much later. Not that they’ll be able to judge me then. No, that’s happening now, by a much higher power.
It’s appeared like this because that’s what I believe it to be. It’s how I’ve always described myself… metaphorically. But it is so much more than that. Only metres away and I can feel the iciness of its touch: black tendrils spreading out from the main body, entering my mind.
I see it suddenly as everything you people think it is. Flashing in front of my eyes, the images changing as I blink: the angel, face blank, wings unfurled and flapping; then the knight on horseback, brandishing his sword; next the monster, the spider-creature with red eyes (red like rubies, like her lips, like the blood on her dress… like the blood on my hands back then). There’s blood on them now, too: as I clutch at my stomach in an attempt to hold it in— the bullets having done their worst.
All of these representations I see, and so many more:
A young boy (looks like Cheryl’s son) also winged, but the wings are the color of cream. I know his name is Thanatos. Blink. Now an old, ugly woman, gnarled and twisted (like Rita after the stroke), with a long blue nose (cornflower blue), and a poisonous tongue. This is Giltinė. Blink. Suddenly a thing with three eyes and leathery skin, and skulls in its headdress— it has a snout and fanged teeth. It holds court (just as Stoddard once did) to decide my fate. This is Yama. Blink. Something with a bone-like head, eyes gazing out of it, all teeth, wearing a necklace of human eyeballs. Mictlantecuhtli. Blink. A pitch-black crow, morphing into an eel, a wolf, then a cow… then a beautiful naked woman with hair like sunshine. This is Lil… no, Morrigan the Phantom Queen. Blink. A toga-clad figure with tanned skin, holding a thin rod with a hook on the end… He has a jackal’s head. Anubis. Blink. A figure in rags, standing in a boat on a smoky river, holding out a hand, waiting for payment. Charon, the Ferryman. Blink. A short man, wearing a tall hat, smoking a cigar, holding an apple in his left hand. Papa Ghede, the corpse of the first man who ever died.
Faster now, image upon image. A hooded man in a cloak, face pale, head totally bald, playing chess… Blink. A woman, also pale, but with black eyeliner and spiky hair— a goth, wearing a silver ankh on a chain around her neck and sporting an Eye of Horus tattoo below her right eye… Blink. A man standing next to a white sports car, dressed in a sharp designer suit, looking a bit like Samuel L. Jackson… Blink. A dragon-headed thing, with razor-sharp talons… Blink. Something that is little more than streams of crackling electricity… Blink. A figure made of fire, like the one that raged in the apartment block where thirty people lost their lives…
They died at my hands. Because I was pretending to be something I’m not.
And the last one, finally. The smooth, bleached skeleton holding a scythe, cloak wrapped around it like an extension of itself. Like a shadow. The (Grim) Reaper. The entity after which I was named… by those who’d been waiting for me at my last assignment, who’d been tracking me even as I tracked my next target— my research meticulous. It has been their job to try and put an end to my spree.
‘The Reaper’ they called me. And I am… was. Have been ever since—
Red as rubies; red as the blood on her dress; on my hands. Lily lying at my feet, Thomas running from the picnic, though he wouldn’t escape. It was his time, just as it had been hers. I made that decision; for them, and those who followed (but I didn’t enjoy it, honestly, not even the first. I’m not like you people out there murdering, savoring it; not like you at all!).
Only… it hadn’t really been my decision to make, had it? Truth is, I’ve been doing this for so long, I think I’d actually convinced myself. But I can’t fool him … her … it. The thing in front of me. The one I was emulating.
All those people had more time left, I can see that now, I’m being shown, it’s passing before my eyes. All those futures: Cheryl going on to run for the local council, her son becoming a pilot, her daughter a model; Albert and Rita dying together still, but in their sleep, in their bed, not roasting alive in what must have felt like the fires of Hell (no religion, remember? there’s nothing… but, oh Christ, I really hope there’s something afterwards now). A fire I started with a bottle of vodka and a lit rag. Even the lawyer, Stoddard, who might not have realized the error of his ways, but whose money would pay the medical bills to keep him around ‘till he was a hundred. (If he’d only told me the combination of his safe, I might even have let him live… I only needed a few thousand to keep my work going.)
I’d always assumed Death was detached. Calm, unemotional. Neutral. Impartial, neither right nor wrong, neither virtuous nor wicked. Not today. Today Death has come for me— might even have engineered this whole thing, sick to the stomach of this insect’s capers.
And today Death is angry.
Now I understand what true power is. (And I can finally feel my heart pounding in my chest again— though not for much longer, I suspect.) The being that stands before me is forever, older than time itself, while time is running out for me. That’s why it’s been forcing me to recall every single face. How I’ve wasted all my allotted time; all the people I’ve ever wrongly taken. No, not taken, because only one of us can do that. And it isn’t me… God almighty (oh please be listening now!). It. Isn’t. Me.
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