Into the Night

{New} Ch. 2 : Death Declined

As usual, death came unexpected. It stepped through the wreckage, in no hurry, its tattered cloak fluttering in the autumn night's wind.

It reaped their souls as a child would pick apples in an orchard. Reaching into their chests, clutching tight, and snapping it free from their branch. Their life force passed from their bodies to its chest, glowing ever so faintly as it went about its unending task. Then it came across a young man gasping in a pool of his own blood.

He fought to breathe.

Death watched with curiosity. Even a being without immortality could see that he should have bled out already. It pressed the side of its head against the dying man's chest, expecting a still heart to come, but instead it received the sound of one that refused to stop.

His midnight blue eyes darted across the landscape, far off into the distant. They searched for someone to save him, but the knight in shining wouldn't come. In the grand scheme of monsters and men, the prior tended to feast on the latter. No remorse; no second thought. The darkness snuffed out the light.

Such a shame, the grim reaper thought. It would have been a kinder fate than the one it saw the creature living.

It contemplated ending him briefly. There wasn't a single sin drifting on his soul.  So pure, so light, so willing to float to the pearly gates...

Purity was such a rare trait, even in heaven, that it loathed the idea of letting it continue to be sullied by the world. It hated the thought.

What's a few seconds, days, years, difference when it comes to preserving an endangered species? Its long boney finger tapped on the lone survivor's forehead and with its touch came his last breath.

The reaper expected to enjoy returning one of god's innocent creatures to heaven. Instead he was  assaulted by the foul odour of his soul.

It grew larger and shaped into a bright blue will-o-wisp. By then the smell became unbearable like smoke filling a house. It was suffocating.

Death rose from the crouch it found itself in while awaiting his expiration.

"What are you?"

It brushed its hands through the soul as one might do with swamp water. Through the wisps of the souls, it searched. Hidden deep within it found the mark that branded him a corruption.

"Monster, " The reaper spat, stepping back, "You can't fool me... "

It shrunk away on the battlefield as a few souls drifted close behind it. A painfully beautiful light blossomed out and one by one, they vanished until that gate to heaven flickered away. A gate that the survivor would never step through himself.

With the reaper departed he sank back down in his body, a feather drifting to the ground. A soul returning to a body.

The ongoing crime scene continued. To the wreckage strewn about an open road, to the untamed grasses the wreck launched him in, to the blood soaked monster feasting on the person that was trying to get his number.

Snap, snap, snap. The meat parted from bone as the creature continued. A bloodlust fuelled the hunt, but a primal desire to feed gave it pleasure from its reward. If it were human a smile would have been planted firmly on its lips.

It took another survivor's body in its jaws, shaking it around like a dog with a brand new chew toy. It tossed the bruised carcass into the air, spraying scarlet across the dry brown grass, as it caught its snack midair.

At least their bodies didn't go to waste, the newly dead thought as it slurped away the poor person's innards. What a horrid meaning for their life, for their death. To be a meal for a monster- what a waste. All the hours spent worrying about petty things, about celebrity nonsense, about dumb boys...