Flashback
Part I
Resolutions made, because hindsight is 20-20
As the sun rose on the first day of the New Year, he made a silent resolution.
This year, he resolved not to die.
More specifically, he resolved not to die again. He had already died twice this week, and frankly, it was becoming somewhat of a mild irritation.
Both times, it was by her hand (well, more or less), so needless to say, she wasn't one of his favourite people at the moment. She was almost certainly off his Hogswatch card list (not that, he supposed, he'd be sending many cards now).
Killing someone once is one thing, but twice? That was just rude. What was more, it showed a rather appalling lack of preparation; if you did it right the first time, you'd never have to kill the same person twice.
And he made it his business to do it right the first time. It may have him lost points for neatness, but he was nothing if not thorough. It was all about attention to detail and the proper preparation; and no one could say that he wasn't prepared – for anything, really.
He had thought he made sure of that.
He had thought he had expected the unexpected, until it had crept up on him, rather unexpectedly (that is the trouble with the unexpected: one rarely expects it).
Hindsight, he mused, is easy: hindsight is always 20-20. Foresight, however, is a lot more difficult some people pray to Blind Io for it,(1) others try mediums and fortune-tellers, but generally trying to read the future is lot like sticking your hand into a large sack and feeling around until something bites you.(2) He had learned that in what he considered the hard way, because there aren't many things harder than a solid iron poker, especially when it's wedged into your ribcage.
Because he wasn't sure where to go next, he walked (or floated, he couldn't be sure) several feet behind the figure carrying his body. It wasn't that he hadn't thought about the afterlife –generally the less you thought about it, the more sure you were that if you had your potato you'd be fine. If you gave serious thought to religious matters, you realised that you couldn't be sure of anything. In fact, he wasn't entirely sure where he was now, only that it was where he went after he faded out of reality. Possibly, it wasn't anywhere at all. Possibly, it wasn't even a 'where' at all.
He looked into the face of his own lifeless body, slung over the shoulder of the figure in the robe (the anthropomorphic personification of Death) and wondered where it was being taken.
It is being taken… the skeleton paused, answering the question no one asked Somewhere far away – to prevent any inconvenient questions.
"Hmmm," the ghost smiled an odd, sideways smile that was neither happy nor sad, giving no indication as to what the apparition was thinking.
"There won't be a funeral, then. It's just as well," he said cheerfully "No one would have come anyway," he laughed although, Death reflected, there was nothing vaguely humorous about the situation.
"No one will care, really – I'm sure some will be happyto see me go… and soon," he sighed in a faraway, hollow voice "Soon, I suppose, they'll forget me altogether. It'll be like I never existed…"
There was a moment of silence, punctured by a cheerful "So, it's just as well really. No one to pay for a proper burial - it'd really put a damper on things. I mean, I don't even have any family left-"
Yes. Death replied flatly. I know. I was there.
"Oh," this was followed by a quick laugh "Well, of course!"
Several minutes went by in silence (or didn't, the ghost wasn't entirely sure how it worked here) as the skeleton strode purposefully onward.
"I suppose you remember how they died, then?" the ghost's voice was very, very small now, and thin as paper "My parents?"
I remember everything that has happened since the dawn of time, and indeed, some time even before even that. Regrettably, this includes the death of your parents.
"I don't remember any of it,"
Yes, you were very young at the time.
"...I-,"
Perhaps, there are some things best left forgotten, Mr. Teh-eh-tim-eh.
Death didn't much feel like having a friendly conversation with Teatime as the task at hand weighted heavily on his skull. Death knew where he had to leave the body; there really was only one place it could go. It was a place he very seldom visited, a place where death had little hold, a disconcerting, surreal place of snow and ice - the elves' kingdom. It was a rare place that could make Death feel off-kilter, but the tenuous grasp he had on the creatures always made him slightly ill-at-ease (seeing only what was really there, the elves appeared to him as a constantly flickering set of different images representing the all the myriad ways that individual humans perceived them).(3)
However, it was the only place to put the body to prevent inconvenient questions being asked back on the Disc. The company he was keeping did little to ease the skeleton's mind - there was something just intrinsically wrong about Teatime, and the worst part was that the boy didn't even seem to realise it. Death knew that souls usually got whatever they thought was coming to them, and usually he didn't mind (it wasn't his business to mind). But this time… this time it was particularly jarring.
From Teatime's point of view, he had always been a good boy: he always did as he was told – never outright breaking the rules (bending them yes, slipping by on technicalities, yes – but never breaking them), and he was constantly assiduous, dedicated, and diligent in his work. He studied hard, often doing extra-credit assignments (albeit ones no one had asked him to do, or wanted him to do) in his free time. He didn't spend his money on drink and women, but invested it wisely, keeping it safe for a rainy day. He always maintained a polite, friendly, helpful demeanour and had very neat handwriting. From where he was standing (err, floating?) he had done nothing wrong.
He was sure.
Nearly sure.
Sort of sure.
Damn.
Those nasty, nagging little thoughts – those horrid things she(4) had said - had come again to the front of his mind like tiny bubbles rushing to the water's surface. He tried to push them aside by latching onto the familiar in the face of the unknown. Why, this was just like back in school when he would get a sudden attack of nerves right before getting the results of a test (and what is life but the ultimate test?), he told himself. Everything would be fine, he had put in the spadework, after all – and why, he might even be lauded as a hero for his efforts. Yes, it was so sensible really.
So sensible that he (almost) believed it.
Footnotes
1 According to legend, Blind Io traded one of his eyes for supreme wisdom, in the form of the many all-seeing eyes that watch the world for him. Some legends say the other one was lost in a poker game with Destiny, other schools of thought say it was eaten by one of his ravens (which explains their absence in later myths), others say he pawned it for whiskey money.
2 Troll lore states that we go through time walking backwards, as we can see clearly where we've already been, but not where we're going.
3 If he concentrated really hard, they dissolved into pools of nouns and adjectives.
4 She (in italics) was only ever that one person.
Author's Note: A reworking of an old fic, cleaned up to fit with the new continuity I've got.