Pain Is Worse Than Death

Death Meets a Witch

A/N: The Agathario origin story I wrote in this will be very different from the one I wrote before the show ended. But feel free to go and read that one too. That one is called 'Evil Origins.'

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"Do I have to go?" The poor soul of an old lady asked as she was led through a door to the Other Side by, to her surprise, a woman. Her dark hair and soft dark eyes gave the old lady a sense of peace that she didn't understand. She had expected some terrifying creature or a purely white angel, but the woman was neither. With only a simple nod, the dark haired Being assured the lady that she did need to go, but she could sense that everything would be alright. Just as she set foot in the door, the old lady's gray hair turned to a beautiful shade of red, her haircolor from her younger years, and the wrinkles upon every inch of her body dissipated as she returned to her younger self and she happily crossed over.

Rio Vidal, also known as Lady Death, watched as she collected her umpteenth soul. With a bit of a sigh, she began to feel a sense of boredom. Occasionally she would meet a soul that gave her a bit of amusement or even a little challenge when it came to crossing over, but they were still all the same. Her life, or lack thereof, had always felt the same. Collect bodies and go. Collect bodies and go. Explain to a few why they cannot stay. Explain to a few that she is not an angel nor a demon. Blah blah blah. Collect their bodies and go. Nothing new.

Looking around at the old lady's bedroom, she wondered what it might be like to be human. Even for a day. Her eyes fell to the woman's bed. Her mind reeled as she wondered what sleep felt like. She wondered how it would feel to be completely exhausted and to lay down on a nice looking cot and go to sleep to relieve that exhaustion. She looked to the open window as a light breeze blew through it. Her mind wandered to thoughts of what it would be like to have chapped skin in the chilled air. She could feel hot and cold on her skin, but was never affected by it. She never shivered and she never sweat. It fascinated her. She fantasized about it. She longed for it.

She was soon called out of her thoughts when another gust of wind blew but only upon her body and it did not come from the window, a sign there was another new fallen soul out there and she magicked herself out of the old woman's home.

To teleport only took about three seconds. And in that third second, just before she arrived at her destination, she could feel that one fallen soul, had turned into seven. She came upon, what looked to be, a new stake risen to kill a witch in the forest of Salem, Massachusetts in June of 1693. She was all too familiar with taking the souls of the recently damned witches and the innocent women accused of being one. But to her surprise, this night, when she arrived, there was no smoke. No fire. And no corpse up on the stake. She took a step into the moonlight to see seven corpses lying around it in a circle. Across the circle, Death could see that one of the witches, perhaps, had survived. No. She was the only survivor. Perhaps the one that had been sentenced to death and should be up on the stake, but instead, she walked freely amongst the fallen, bending over to take something from one of the corpses. The woman then flew up into the air, a cloud of purple surrounding her.

Death looked at the seven bodies on the ground before curiously flying up into the air above the trees. "What did you take?"

The other woman stopped and hovered above the cedar trees before she turned to see the hooded figure behind her. "Who are you?"

"What did you take?" The Being dressed in green robes repeated, keeping her hood over her face so as not to be seen by the, clearly, very powerful witch in front of her.

"Why does it matter to you?"

The one in green hesitated before slowly pulling her hood down to reveal her face to the other. It resembled a skull, but contained the skin of a human with eyes the color of the wood beneath them. She expected the other witch to recoil or feel frightened enough to tell her what she had taken from one of the corpses.

But instead, the one in purple seemed fascinated as her lips curled to a simple smile. She looked down at the bodies beneath them before looking back up at Death. "You have come to take them."

"What did you take? I must know. If it is something important, it can cause the spirit to remain here with unfinished business. I can't have that."

"It's nothing, really. Just a simple brooch."

Death tried to read the witch's mind to detect a lie, but something blocked her from her thoughts and if she'd had lips, she would have smiled. "You are not afraid of me." Death told her. It would have been a question, but by the way the purple witch spoke to Death with a hint of boredom and annoyance in her tone, Death knew for a fact, that the witch was not afraid.

"Why would I be? You are not here for me and if you were...I would refuse to go with you."

"You cannot defy the inevitable. One day, you will come."

"Mm, yes, but that day is not TOday. Is it?" She waited for Death to answer and when she didn't the purple witch smiled and turned around again to leave.

"I will see you again." Death told her.

"I have no doubt that you will." The younger witch spoke with her back to the Being and she flew away.