For an Anon who responded to a prompt request "Put a 'Kill me' in my ask and I'll write a drabble about my character killing yours'. I didn't have any character specification, but I was told to make it dark and twisted. Ta-dah! I hope you like it.
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters shown here.
Dedication: the Kill Me Anon
Kill Me
Since the house is on fire let us warm ourselves. ~Italian Proverb
Her ribs were about to burst whether she died or not. Coughing up smoke nonstop did that to a person. She tried sticking to the floor but the equipment in the shop was aflame and it was hard to find a safe path to take, even if she knew her grandfather's shop better than she knew her own apartment. Everything was burning. Nothing was safe. It was orange and yellow and when the flames died, everything was black dust only. It was only a matter of time before something that wasn't supposed to burn, oil or cleaning fluid or…
There was a flash and a boom.
It was as if the curtains closed after a show. Except this was Esperanza's life we were talking about.
"Is there an Esperanza Maria Valdez in line?" A ghost holding a scroll, long and silvery like his beard, clamoured as he came through.
"Yes," she said. Other ghosts said yes too, trying to get out of the line, trying to find an escape route from it.
She elbowed a woman with a high-pitched voice. "My name is Esperanza Valdez," she said. She had to yell over the crowd, but the ghost spotted her and glided in her direction. He looked at his scroll and at her face, which told Anza that he had a picture of her.
"I can't recognise your face ma'am I'm sorry but..." he said.
"I was in an accident," Esperanza said quickly, touching her face. She couldn't feel anything, but her fingers felt rough skin. Touching her cheeks would probably sting like heck if she weren't so numb.
"Your hair looks shorter."
"The end burned off."
"Your eyes have cataracts…"
"Smoke," Anza explained.
"Ah," the ghost said. "That explains it. Why he wants to see you… Of course. Well, Miss Valdez, come with me."
He held out his hand. She took a step forwards on her own.
"I'm afraid that it's not a choice I'm giving you," he said. "You really do have to hold on. We have quite a distance to travel, you see, and there are strict rules regarding souls traveling through Elysium."
Esperanza took his hand figuring that now was not the time to rebel and be a troublemaker, and she was lifted off her feet. Like a real ghost.
They floated around before landing at a big palace that could easily be mistaken for a haunted house. Piers and gables, porticos, turrets, dark shingles… It looked plucked out of the Victorian era. And for all she knew, maybe that's exactly when the house had been built. She doubted many rules of physics that she'd learned and come used to applied here.
The ghost led her to a terrace, tiled in dark marble with rough iron porches, climbed by gorgeous jewel-based flowers. What she really noticed first though was the other person there. Not some scary overlord of the dead, a prestigious royal, an intimidating ruler. He was a teddy bear at the core despite the rough outside, he was wearing his oil-stained clothes, his leg was in his brace and he hadn't shaved in a few days so he must've been working on something pretty cool.
"Lord Hephaestus," the ghost said. "I have found you your ghost."
He turned around and registered them, wincing at the name the ghost gave her. His eyes were set on her, and she realised how long it'd been since they'd talked. She hadn't imagined their reunion to be in the underworld, but it was better than nothing, she supposed.
"Thank you, Gregorias. You can… go."
The ghost disappeared in thin air.
"Anza," the god said quietly.
"Hank." His name was too much of a mouthful and there weren't enough hours in a day to say it. Pretty clear that his mother didn't love him in her opinion. Anyways, she'd always defaulted to Hank and never had he minded.
"Look at you," he said. His face was twisted in emotion. She guessed that maybe it was hard to tell if you didn't know him really well, but Esperanza did. Grief was doing the damage, maybe?
"Me? Look at you. You should shave," she said.
"There are a lot of things I should do," he said. He touched her cheek gingerly. "Do you feel anything?"
"I'm dead." Esperanza said.
"That doesn't mean you don't feel," Hephaestus said. "At least… at least I hope not."
"It's numb for now," she said.
"The feeling will come back with a vengeance eventually, by the way." Hephaestus said. He walked away. "Gods, Anza, I'm so sorry."
"You weren't around, that's fine." She said.
"I should have told you that Leo's powers came with a trigger," he said knotting his hands in his hair. His eyes were watery and it put her at loss. He was crying, or might as well be... for her?
"I knew that," Esperanza said. "Is he okay? What scared him? Stop doing that with your hands and dry up your eyes. You wouldn't have told me anything I didn't know."
"Well then I should have said that a lot of old forces were waking, that something like this might happen… I knew, Anza, and I didn't say a word."
"What would I have done differently?" Esperanza said. "I didn't have my keys, I had to go back. I wouldn't have brought Leo back in in a thousand years, he gets distracted whenever he notices something new and I wanted to get him home for bed."
He shook his head, not convinced.
"My realm is my responsibility. I may as well have tied you up and put you in front of a firing squad."
"Stop exaggerating."
"You had a horrible death."
"Yes I did and if I have to listen to one more word of this, my afterlife is off to a very bad start." Esperanza said.
He stopped and gave her the puzzled woman, what are you saying look. Classic.
She walked up to him and put a hand on each shoulder.
"You didn't kill me." She said. "Leo didn't kill me. I died in a fire."
"You seem so at ease with this already."
"I've been standing in that line for a while," Anza said. "I may have uncovered the meaning of the universe on the side. What I need to know is what triggered Leo and is he okay?"
"He's shaken."
"Is he hurt?" She asked insistently.
"Not that I know of."
"Hank..." She groaned.
"No, no. He's fine."
She breathed in a sigh of relief. Step one, make sure mijo was safe. Check. Step two, figure out why mijo may have not been safe. Step three, to determine later.
"He's shaken and exhausted, so I think he's at the hospital still. Your sister just left."
"Why is she leaving him?" Esperanza asked.
"Gods know."
"That's what I was counting on," Esperanza said. Hephaestus made a face at her.
"What triggered him… That's harder. I'm not exactly sure myself. I think… Well, the best guess I have is… Gaia, the Earth."
Esperanza squinted and tried to put a missing piece in the genealogical puzzle known as Greek mythology.
"Isn't she your great-grandmother?"
"I suppose so," he shrugged.
"Good God, you just don't have any look with maternal figures do you?" Esperanza said.
Hephaestus grinned, and he wiped it off his face seconds later. "Does now really seem like the time for jokes?"
"You've seen me joke as I'm giving birth," Esperanza said. "Does your question really look purposeful now?"
He smiled sadly. "You really are one in a million. I'm sorry that it ended like this for you."
"I am too," Esperanza said. "But you know what, if I have to be killed by a primordial goddess so be it. As long as the two most important boys in my life are okay afterwards, and as long as they stop believing that they had me come to a sticky end."