"Where is everybody?" the medical examiner wondered. "I thought they were having the wedding here. I promised to be there!"
The surf pounded on the beach to his left, and he looked out towards the ocean. A thunderstorm was rolling in. He knew he should go home or return to the office, but he kept walking.
The phone rang.
He hesitated for a few seconds, then answered.
"Hello?" he asked, raising his voice against the surf. "Yes, this is Dr. Mallard."
The voice on the other end continued speaking, as a horrified expression crept over his face. His mouth twisted in horror as he listened to the person on the other end speaking about a bomb that had gone off directly outside the NCIS office building. His friends and co-workers were there, and he wondered what had happened to them. Had they survived?
"Dear God!" he exclaimed. In a slightly more subdued voice, he asked, "How many?"
The voice on the other end didn't need to ask how many what. They knew Ducky meant how many dead.
"Yeh, of course. Teh-teh-teh-tell them I'll be I'll be there right away. Yeah, it's imperative that no-one touches any of the deceased until I uh, until I re-" he held the phone away from his face, and tried to take a breath. He felt like his chest was constricting. Lances of pain shot through him as he sank to his knees before collapsing heavily at the edge of the water.
The world went black for a moment, then he felt someone shaking his shoulder.
"Dr. Donald Mallard." a voice said.
Ducky noticed that the voice sounded like a teenager before he opened his eyes. "What am I doing lying here?" he asked suddenly, surprised.
"What do you think?" the voice asked, sounding faintly amused. "Heart attack sufferers do this all the time."
"Heart attack sufferers?" the man asked.
"Let me help you up and I'll explain." came the voice. As Mallard had expected, a teenager moved into his field of vision, and grabbed Ducky's left arm. "Up you get." he grunted.
Finally, the medical examiner was standing, slightly unsteadily on the sand. He looked down in shock, seeing his body still lying there on the sand.
"What is happening to me?" he asked.
"You suffered a heart attack, and are now hovering between the world of the living and the world of the dead." the teen replied.
"So, I'm not dead." Donald replied.
"But you aren't exactly alive either. I appear to have you at a disadvantage, Dr. Mallard. My name is Ajax." the youth extended his hand, and the doctor shook it warily.
"I haven't just committed to being dead, have I?" he asked.
The teen snorted. "No, there are a few I'd do that to, but you're a decent enough fellow, trying to do some good somewhere in the world, leave a positive impact, all that."
"You really weren't what I expected I'd see when I died." Dr. Mallard said, continuing his interrupted walk along the waterline.
The teen fell into step beside him. "What did you expect? This?" He snapped his fingers and changed to look like a walking skeleton wearing a hooded black cloak and carrying a Reaper's scythe.
"To be honest, yes." the kindly medical examiner replied.
The skeleton nodded briefly and changed back to the teen. "Well, I'm not Death. I am one of his corporeal agents, which is a long story you won't be privy to just yet, but I'm not the reaper himself. I'm going to help you cross the river, eventually. I still have to wait…" the teen hauled out an antique pocket watch and opened it. "…approximately four minutes before guiding you over."
"Why so long?" Ducky asked.
"Because your heart attack wasn't lethal. There are some things where it happens, and boom. Dead. This one, there's a chance, so long as help arrives. At such time, you can make a choice. Do you return to the land of the living, or do you carry on to 'the next great adventure', as that fool Dumbledore kept saying?"
Doctor Mallard thought about it for several seconds. "I'll go back if I can." he said gravely. "My friends and co-workers need my help."
"I know." Ajax replied, smiling slightly. "That's why we haven't gone to the dock yet."
Ethereal voice floated on the wind.
"Charge to 360!"
"Clear!"
A reverberating thunderclap nearly knocked Ajax to his knees, and dragged the doctor back towards the body he had stepped out of a few moments ago.
"Charging to 350!"
"Clear!"
A second thunderclap tore through the air.
"Good luck, Doctor Mallard!" Ajax shouted. His form flickered slightly, standing in the surf before his disappeared altogether.
Doctor Mallard crawled the rest of the way to his body, which was now lying on a cart in an ambulance.
"Charging….clear!"
A final thunderclap and Doctor Mallard's soul rejoined with the body it had recently quit.
In the crowded vehicle, the heart rate monitor began beeping rhythmically as Ducky's heart restarted and maintained a steady, if rather slow heartbeat.