So I recently read this freaking amazing book called The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. The story is told through Death's point of view. In the first chapter, Death describes the colors he notices as a distraction from the survivors that have escaped him. So when the monthly contest from CHB forum was put up—write a story based on a color prompt, essentially—I was like, Death, colors, why not?

This is the scene from Battle of the Labyrinth. It was a super chaotic scene, and the prompt for blue was "Chaos/Calm." And this was the scene where there were actual deaths, so I decided to narrate it the way Markus Zusak narrated his book. Hope you enjoy.

This time, it was blue.

No one ever sees the other colors. To them, the sky is either a deep, dark blue of midnight or the clear cerulean of high noon in the summer.

How wrong they are. I have seen purple skies, white skies, even sickly greenish skies. Suprisingly, I haven't seen a lot of blue. No one seems to die on days when the sky is blue.

I will always remember the blue.

Today I collected twenty-seven souls.

They were all there, fully armed. Standing in silence in front of a crack in a rock. I waited. I would collect many souls that day.

Then the monsters burst out of the crack, and chaos broke out.

Chaos has never been blue. It has always been red, or black, or something along those lines.

But it was blue.

I watched as they fought with the monsters, stabbing them and slicing them and whirling around. It was a loud, ugly scene. Everything seemed to be flying everywhere. Stones. Sticks. Swords and arrows. A boy dressed in black summoned an army of "undead" skeleton warriors.

I always laugh at that term—I have collected their souls. They are as dead as dead can be.

Finally, the largest monster of all appeared. She had the top half of a woman and the lower half of a dragon. Around her waist was a belt of animal healds—living animal heads, snarling and snapping and spitting. Kampê.

(Don't ask me how I know.)

They attacked her. Most of the monsters were dead—I say dead, but no creature is truly dead until their souls have left their bodies and been collected by me—and the rest had been forced back. It was just them against the monster.

Then I saw him.

The soul I had been after for two millenia. The soul that had evaded me, capturing itself in an immortal, undestroyable form.

Daedalus.

I wanted to swoop down and grab him. I resisted. Eons of doing this job have taught me patience.

Suddenly a barrage of rocks flew through the air and towards Kampê. Soon, she was buried. I almost went to collect her soul, but remembered. Patience.

The monsters still fought, but they were slowing down. More and more of them fell to the ground, but more and more came out. It was starting to seem as if I would collect all of their souls.

Then an unearthly scream exploded.

That is the only word I can use. Exploded. Because it was an explosive sound. The sound of fear. If that battle was chaos before, now it was pandemonium. Bright blue pandemonium.

It terrified the monsters. It terrified everyone. I had just time to pinpoint its source—a satyr. I remembered the soul I had just collected—the creator of that sound, Pan. The monsters raced back into the crack. It was over.

A boy lay on the ground. I remembered who he was. He had summoned the skeleton warriors. Evidently that had taken a toll on him. People were clustered around him, pouring nectar into his mouth. Daedalus stood silently nearby. Like a shadow, I stood behind him. I could barely sense his soul. It was very tired. I felt that it would be glad to see me.

The boy lying on the ground sat up and started talking to Daedalus. They mentioned a soul-for-a-soul exchange. I was disgusted. I am permanent. There is no trading of souls. Nothing can bring the dead back. I was glad when they decided against it.

Then the boy drew his sword. He said some words, and Daedalus died. I took his soul in my arms.

The sky was still blue.