Discworld, its characters, etc., belong to Terry Pratchett.

EDIT 12/01/11: I've finally gotten the book and read it. I'll be writing from a blend of that and the film adaptation. There're admirably huge overlaps between the two, but there are also side stories in the book and details in the film that don't overlap, and I'll touch on all of them. Be warned.

EDIT 07/07/12: Light editing in this chapter. Prepare yourself for larger changes later, thought.

That … that chit! That little baggage!

His training did not allow for any words that were a single whit less polite. That girl thought she'd beaten him! Him of all people! Well, yes, she'd killed him, that was incontrovertible fact, but that didn't mean she'd won.

Jonathan Teatime was seated, tailor-style, beside a blissed-out golem somewhere between This World and The Next. The surroundings were flat gray, and he was sitting on the assumption of down, because there was no visible distinction between ground, sky, and anything else. His fists were tucked into the valley made of his crossed ankles, and his shoulders were up 'round his ears, pushing his yellow curls out of order. Nobody could sulk like a disappointed Teatime, and he was really putting his mind to it.

He'd only been doing his job, you see. Sort of. Extra-curricular stuff, if you wanted to be particular about it, since he had technically fulfilled the contract and rid the world of the Hogfather. The entity that went by that title had been what could be called, for an anthropomorphic manifestation, eliminated; it wasn't Teatime's fault that the teeth and spell that had been used to achieve this effect were scattered afterward. He certainly hadn't thrown himself over the railing of a balcony several hundred feet up. That was Susan's fault.

Teatime had only wanted to test a hypothesis: Death could die, couldn't he? Or could he? Was there a soul there for collection, and if so, who would collect it? Was nobody interested in the deeper philosophical questions (apart from that swotty wizard with the spectacles, who clearly was only interested in the questions themselves rather than field research)?

The point was that Susan didn't get it. That's what made the whole situation insufferable to Teatime. She was not superior to him and hadn't earned her victory. She was alive not because she'd killed him; she was alive because Teatime had chosen not to inhume her. He would have to pull off both boots to count on the decently countable parts of his body to enumerate how many opportunities he had had – and had ignored – to eliminate her. And unless he could figure out a way to get back on the Disc, she would never know, and she'd wander around all smug and safe and boring and bored. Teatime could think of no worse fate, especially for someone with such potential to be fascinating.

Well. He'd refused to go with Death to the Elsewhere that waited for mortal souls. Teatime had seen this golem, which had refused to respond to him, no matter what threats he'd made, and had realized there was at least one other option to allowing the Reaper to shuffle him along. Teatime was fairly certain he'd disgruntled Death, and if he, Teatime, couldn't kill him, Death, then at least Teatime could distinguish him-, Teatime, -self in other ways.

And since he'd set the precedent of tossing spanners into the post-mortem works, he saw no reason not to push onward and see what else he could accomplish.

Teatime blinked down at the way the veins in the back of his hands suddenly threw sharp shadows. He frowned, straightening and then getting inhumanly quickly to his feet.

Where the blazes was that light coming from? And why was it getting brighter? And why was it blue?

He lifted one hand to shield his eyes.

Then he grinned.