Title: End Game
Author: tromana
Rating: T
Characters: Death, Cook
Summary: Who else but Death himself is worthy of taking Cook into the afterlife?
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Notes: Written for miss_peg as part of the Holiday Fics challenge. She's possibly the biggest fan of Death who hasn't actually read any of Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels that I know. Also for skinsprompt Table D.
End Game
"I'm Cook," Cook growled at Foster, before lunging.
I KNOW.
It took him a few seconds for his feet to reach a grinding halt. The reply had balked him, had taken him off guard. He hadn't expected Foster to reply so confidently, in such a tone as that. Cold, almost clinical, in a way. Then, he shook his head. It wasn't fucking Foster standing in front of him, not anymore. Instead, it was a completely different figure, swathed in black robes.
Fucking weirdo.
"Who the fuck are you?" he questioned, demanding as he did so.
He glanced over the man's shoulder and Foster was sauntering away, without a care in the world. Overconfident tosser. Cook was going to kill him. He was going to bash his skull in with a baseball bat, just as he had done so to Freddie. It was the very least he could do to honour his friend. Nobody fucked around with people who James Cook cared about and got away with it. Automatically, he tried to shove the domineering figure away from him, but he couldn't get past. Bastard. How could he stop him when a fucking murderer was getting away and he was out for blood?
I THINK YOU ALREADY KNOW.
Cook sat down and regarded the figure dubiously. He was a bit on the skinny side; could probably have done with a good meal or two. A burger or something. Not that that would help. This man was skinny to the extreme, like the Africans and shit he saw on television during charity campaigns. The kind of person who was practically at death's door.
Then, Cook looked at his feet.
Laying in front of him was an all too familiar body. He didn't scream; for some reason, that didn't feel right, though he had a feeling that screaming would have been more than appropriate given the situation. Nobody would take the piss if they realised you had just seen your own bloodied and motionless body at your feet.
"No way," he muttered, "you, you're just a thing people make up. A fancy dress costume."
The figure grinned at him. It seemed even more bony, even more fixed and permanent than beforehand.
THE PHRASE IS ANTHROPOMORPHIC PERSONIFICATION.
"Whatever."
Cook paced slowly around the plastic boxes, all the time avoiding looking at the contents, at Freddie's bloodied clothing. How the fuck had Foster managed to overpower him? Had he been armed unexpectedly? Did he have a gun? He didn't remember seeing one, or hearing a gunfire.
He didn't even remember any pain at all.
In fact, the only thing that suggested anything untoward was the presence of the robed skeleton with the rather gaudy looking scythe before him.
How fucking clichéd.
Cook had always believed that death was just that. The end, nothing more, nothing less. You just stopped breathing and stopped thinking. There wasn't anything more to say or do. Nothing stupid like a fucking afterlife with angels or devils or all that shit. The world, existing, ended for you, but for everyone else, it continued as if nothing had changed at all.
"So?"
SO?
"What happens next?"
WELL, MR. I'M COOK, THAT'S UP TO YOU, ISN'T IT?