Grim

Chapter 7 - No Good Deed

Lea Gold is being stalked. She doesn't know it yet, but she is about to kill someone. The man is careful not to be seen as he follows her down the street. He hides in the shadows as she turns onto the street that she lives. I walk down the middle of the European brick street following the two on their trek.

She stumbles in her heels then takes them off. Lea is a bit tipsy from her time in the nearby pub. With no ears I still hear the echos of a distant beat. The man runs up closer to her as she walks. The serpentine pattern she makes down the street makes it hard for the man to predict where she will be, but he must know where she lives.

Lea reaches the stairs leading to her abode clutching the railing while swaying back and forth. She is trying to steady herself before trying her balance on the stairs. That is when the man makes his move. He runs behind her, and reaches for her shoulder.

"No you don't!" A strong grip envelopes the creeper's hand before it could reach the young woman.

Gerry Norris had been hired to watch a man across the street. He saw what was about to happen, and couldn't stand by. Lea is startled by the sudden appearrance of two men directly behind her. She reaches into her purse, and pulls out her tazer. She hits Gerry with the tazer in the chest sending him to the ground. The creeper runs back into the shadows where he came from. Lea stumbles up the stairs with the intention of calling the authorities.

Lea had hit Gerry in the precise spot to cause a short in his pacemaker. His heart chose at that moment to have a siezure. I walk up to him as his face heats up. He lay there sweating out the last moments of his life. I see the panic rise in his eyes as he recognizes me. Yes, death has come for you. His life flashes before his eyes revealing nothing I hadn't seen before. He is a good and just man that has made mistakes in the past. He is going to heaven.

I breathe in to help pull his soul out with his last breath. The soul resists, still clinging to life. I reach out with my left hand to sever it's grip as I have done thousands perhaps millions of times. A voice from within shouts, "NO!" My hand stops.

"Harold? Are you doing this?" I try to will my hand to move on, but there is resistance.

Harold responds, "You can't go on killing people. I will stop you!"

Seriously? He doesn't know what he is doing. "Harold I will explain once I am done, but you must let me do my job." I fight against the force holding my hand back. Gradually I am able to sever the connection and internalize the soul.

Harold decides to fight me again while projecting the soul out. Thankfully he is too late to prevent me from sending Gerry to heaven. "Harold stop!"

"You're nothing but a murderer! Why do you get to choose where to send us when we die? Do you even know what it is like to die?" I can hear and feel the whimpers of Harold's soul.

"We need to talk. I will tell you whatever you want to know, but I can't have you try to resist like this again. What would happen to these souls if left untended would be worse than anything I could do to them. What is it you wish to know?"