I own only Brian. Ok? The rest belongs to Lucas Arts.
Paying off Time
It hadn't been hard. It should have been, it would have been easier, afterwards, if only it had been difficult to pull the trigger.
Manuel Calavera was not evil, but it had been easy, oh so easy, to kill him. He liked to think things weren't so bad after death anyway…
That didn't really justify the murder, anyway. It had been a him-or-me situation, and if he really thought death'd be great, he would have sacrificed himself. But that man did deserve to die, and it couldn't have been murder, not really. Manslaughter.
With a sigh of relief he arrived home, went in and lay down. His thoughts were everywhere, all at once. The only things faster than the speed of light are the thoughts of a man who didn't want to have murdered his best friend.
The day's events were so jumbled; the memories couldn't have been stranger if it were all a dream. But, failing to sleep, he pulled a notepad out from his desk. Some ex-girlfriend, Wendy perhaps, had decided he needed to express his feelings and had bought him a diary. So far he hadn't written so much as a word in it, but now, he couldn't talk to anyone, couldn't keep it bottled up. Maybe this writing thing would work out for the best.
But first, he'd have to get it all in chronological order…
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He had woken up that morning in… no; wait, had he woken up? Had he ever got to sleep last night? Surely, he must have- he had no recollection of tossing and turning that night either, he had no reason to, it had all been quite a normal day before. So yes, he had woken up, and gotten dressed of course in his work suit, a boring black affair…
But all this was quite unimportant, he realised, as he scribbled down the words. He was just trying to put off the time he'd have to write about the murder. He couldn't stand it, that word, murder, it hadn't been murder! But he had to write it, sooner or later. Better to get it over with.
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He had gone to work. Involving some of what might be called irony, he was a salesman. But here he sold cars, not travel packages, even of the living kind. He didn't know of this irony, of course. That both here and beyond the land of the living, it would be work, sale work that got him into deep, deep trouble.
It was stunningly easy at work that day. All fairly gullible people- a couple looking for their son's first car were sold the classic red sports car, and a business woman tired of public transport was sold a basic, yet expensive, black automobile.
Occasionally, Manny felt guilty about all this. These rich, naïve people knew nothing about cars, except how to drive them. Books on the philosophy of morals- for Calavera hid secret interests in literature, philosophy and poetry- mentioned nothing on this, so it was unsure ground. But, he thought, if they couldn't afford it, they wouldn't have bought it.
A fairly average day filled with weak coffee and failed attempts to chat up his favourite co-worker. Well, second favourite. But do bosses really count? Brian (poor guy, is parents had really liked that name) hadn't been a boss for long, and he was a great friend. Fair and all that. An ex-roommate, as well. Met in collage, such a cliché, but such a great friend.
Had this been a book, our main character often reflected, had his life been a book, no doubt it would be a boring novel filled with tales of failed friendships, but brotherly love prevailing over all, in the end. But real life is not like that, for Manny and Brian had been friends, good friends, for nearly eight years now, and not an argument had occurred, not one.
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Oh dear.
"I should have known" He writes, ink flowing freely from his gold-plated, unused pen. And, really, he should have. Brian had to spend about an our in his office each day, after work, and those hours had been getting longer and longer. On Fridays he sat in the pub long after everyone else had gone, on Saturdays he stayed home all day long. He wasn't married and now he seemed to regret it, and yet did nothing to quench his loneliness.
Manny had worried, of course he had, but his attempts to cheer up his boss were always repelled by Brian with the utmost force.
Perhaps he didn't want to cheer up.
So Manny had dropped hints about counselling, but when those too were rejected, he decided the man was just stressed with work and it would be best to let him sort it all out.
Depression. He had thought it, and ignored it. "It will be Ok" he chanted to himself when he worried too much, "it'll be all right" The song of the helpless, he knew, but there was little he could do, and he could never let himself give up.
So he had distracted himself, got on with life, trusting Brian to do the same. The occasional phone call, the occasional rejected invite, they were all he could do.
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It was a Thursday, the most humdrum day of the week, and routine boredom was breathed in by all people present. Such an ordinary day, such an ordinary life.
Then, it had begun.
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He stopped writing, just for a minute. Had it begun there? Had it begun with the call from the office? Had it begun with Brian being promoted, a reward well deserved, or was it when he worked for the promotion? Did it begin with the birth of Brian, or collage, meeting Calavera; was it the start when he got the job as a salesman, or when Manny got one too? Had it begun at all? Was it all part of a huge, unimaginable plan, by God or some other cruel creature? For who, who would kill Brian?
Well, one man has certainly proved he would…
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And it had begun with Brian pressing a button,
Speaking into an intercom "Send up Calavera, would you?" And with barely a glance at the secutary's cleavage, Manny had run up the stairs and into the office.
"Hey!" he said, swinging into a chair.
"Yes, hello, Manny." He sounded tired, unenthusiastic.
"What's the matter?" asked Manny, suddenly ever-so-serious.
"I'm depressed, Manny, you know that."
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He had. He had always known it, really. He had just not wanted to know it. He had watched the happiness of his best friend deteriorate from the sidelines, from far away, never feeing the pain, yet somehow believing he was sympathetic, somehow thinking he had done, was doing, all he could.
The pen was moving on its own. Scribbling words, words, words. Nonsense, most of it for emotion had taken over spelling and tears had washed grammar from its place.
"and then he said manny i
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"Manny, I can cope no longer. You are my best friend. Yet even you are far from me. I am as lonely as the shadow of the reaper. I feel nothing but grief, and yet have little to grieve but life. It is a hard life when a man knows not even why he cries."
He paused, and in the silence, Manny looked at his friend properly for the first time in months. His skin was pale, his eyes yellow and red. There were bags under his eyes large enough to carry the world, and his shoulders were bent as if that was exactly what he had been doing.
Manny shook his head, and opened his mouth. "Brian…"
"Don't make this any harder than it already is. Life has nothing to offer me. Meaning less poetry, pointless work, a non-existent family, and absent friends. A nonsensical depression is all I have, really have to all my own." Another pause, longer than the first. "Do me a favour, Manny. You are my best friend, my only real one. You have tried to help, I know. But all you do fails. But there is one way you can help me, the only way you can help me."
He reached beneath his desk, and pulled out a gun.
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Manny had rarely seen a gun, he had only seen one once before, and he wasn't too interested in them. He had no idea what type this was. But he could feel the death radiating from it, the aura of menace it held was incredible.
And now, his boss, his best friend Barry was laying it out in front of him, and speaking.
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"Shoot me, Manny."
A terrible silence filled the room.
"N…No! No, I won't." Manny was not one to usually stutter, but he was being asked to kill.
The last time he had seen a gun, it was at high school, years and years ago, when some army guys had come in, attempting to persuade possible future recruits. Even then, Manny had not been tricked. It was still death, even when official.
"Manny, I'm sorry, but I can't bring myself to do it. And I need to die. Suicide is sin, so is murder, but you're not religious. Do I not deserve a peaceful death, at the hands of someone I trust?"
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It was funny how alike his speech was to a book. A book on Morals; Right to Death. Can murder be the best thing for someone? If you can not bring yourself to suicide, do you need to die? Can you need to die? Do you have to be religious to have morals? Why is suicide a sin?
The scenario had been different, very different. Life support machines, assisted suicides. It had been heavy on the difference between letting die and killing. One thing to shoot someone, another to let them shoot themselves.
The book was no help, though. Manny could not recall quite what it said, and he felt leaving morals to a book was wrong.
But he did deserve to die. That was true. And Manny was his last hope…
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"Brian… Are you sure? There are options, you know. Counselling, therapy, we could sit down and talk…"
"You are such a salesman, Manny. But I'm sure. Just let me die." Brian's eyes closed, peacefully, as he spoke the last words. He was waiting.
Manny picked up the gun, feeling the weight of it heavy in his hand. He aimed, and pulled the trigger. Almost.
"I can't!" he yelled.
"Do it, Manny. Or I'll shoot both of us." He pulled another gun out.
"Him or me, Him or me." Manny's mind was far from thinking straight. No, it was thinking in drunken zigzags. "He wants to die, this is the right thing to do, it has to be."
it was to persuade himself it was ok.
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How easy it was to pull the trigger, once he had made up his mind. How easy it had been to stop the tears, to pick up the body, lay it out, leave the room, and speak. Telling the secutary it was a suicide. Leaving the building, walking the long, long way home.
And now, writing it all out.
Now it was down, he felt a lot better, and he knew what he had to do.
He left the book open, on the table, a vital clue to any police officers who might come snooping around. Then he pulled the gun from his pocket, the gun Brian had threatened him with. Manuel Calavera lay down, aimed, pulled the trigger, and…
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Died