Chapter three
The cycle continues

-6:00 p.m., same day, Martin's home-

Martin pulled up to his house, having just been through the reading of Anna's will. She had left him a large portion of her estate, but he felt worse than ever. He still felt guilty as the only person who would have been able to save her, and he was sure that he had directly caused her death, since she had survived in his premonition.

I just can't go to the family Thanksgiving dinner. It would be too hard to sit there and see the empty seat beside me, knowing that it's my fault that it's not my seat instead that's absent.

When he opened his door, however, he was in for a huge surprise. Reggie, Carl, Tony, Danielle, Jason, Linda, Jesse and Roger, the security guard who Tony had saved, were all sitting at his table, where a huge banquet was laid out.

"What's all this?" Martin asked, surprised.

"It's our way of saying thank you," Danielle said.

Martin looked at Linda for an explanation.

"I figured you wouldn't want to come to the family thanksgiving dinner, so I called everybody I could, and we decided to come down."

"Sure beats being six feet under – though, I'll admit, I've never tried it," Carl said.

Martin's eyes began to fill with tears. "I don't know what to say," he said.

"Then say 'pull up a chair and pass the turkey', you turkey, we've got two hours until the big game!" Tony said.

"Will do," Martin said happily, realizing how lucky he was to be surrounded by all of these happy people, as well as how lucky he was to have survived such an ordeal.

If only he had.

-Same day, same place, 8:30 p.m.-

Most of the meal had been finished, but everybody was still hanging around. Tony, Reggie, Carl and Roger were watching the big football game, and the rest were just hanging around the same area. Linda was on her laptop, and Tony, despite watching the game, seemed to be diverted by her, much to the chagrin of Martin.

He's a jackass, that much I know from my seven years knowing him. I saved him, and he saved that guard, but that doesn't make me feel any better about him possibly being with Linda.

"Martin, did you hear me?"

Martin jumped. "No, sorry, Linda, I didn't."

"Well, listen up, because this is important. As a matter of fact," she said, raising her voice, "everyone should listen up to this."

Everyone gathered in, except for Tony. "I can hear you fine from here," he said, lowering the volume of the television the tiniest fraction of a notch. "Go ahead."

Ignoring him, Linda began. "I went online to see if what happened to you had ever happened before – you know, with the premonitions and everything.

"It turns out, things like this have happened tons of times before. Airplane crashes, highway collisions, rollercoaster malfunctions, racecar track collapses – you name it, it's happened, only someone knew it was going to happen and saved a few people.

"It turns out, though, that it had just begun for them. Every single one of them that escaped the accidents ended up dying just a few weeks later in mysterious ways, but in the exact same order that they would've died had the first person not intervened. It was almost as if Death himself was stalking them, collecting their souls one by one."

"Bullshit." This remark came from Tony, who had been listening more intently than he had let on. "First of all, what do you mean by 'Death stalking them'?"

"Well, theoretically, Death is the driving force every time someone is killed. When he is thwarted – as was the case here – he would follow the people and sort of rig things so that they would be killed."

"That's crazy. By that logic, me and Martin would be stalked by the Good Fairy Life-ica for saving those people."

"I don't know," Martin said. "She's making a lot of sense."

"Sense? That's not sense. But, okay, I'll play along with you. Martin, who's up first on Killboy's list?"

Suddenly, the football game on television was replaced by a woman. "This is a special news bulletin. Tragedy strikes Callaghan's Circus as their tightrope walker, Joseph Darin, suffers a death most unusual on his tightrope walk. Mr. Darin was halfway across his tightrope when a falling cinderblock forced the tightrope two feet into his abdomen, killing him instantly. Eyewitnesses say a carton of nachos may have-"

Martin muted the television. "Him."

"All right, read the rest of the article, Linda. How can we stop this thing?" Martin asked. This time, the group gathered in even closer than before.

"Okay, okay. According to this, you can't completely stop it, but there are ways of avoiding it."

"Ooh! Ooh! I've got one! Close your eyes and count to ten!" Tony said sarcastically.

"Tony, this is serious!" Martin said.

"Oh, it's serious, all right. It's serious bullshit."

"You just saw-"

"I just saw a guy on a tightrope get killed because he was on a tightrope. Not because Death was stalking him, but because he was an idiot and had a wire shoved two feet up his-"

"Language!" Danielle hollered.

"May I continue?" Linda said irritably.

"By all means," Martin said.

"As I was saying, there are several ways to avoid death. The calamities which cause the survivors' deaths can be averted by other survivors, and none else. When this happens, death skips that person and moves on to the next person on his list. Also, since death must claim his survivors in the correct order, none can die until it is their time."

"I don't believe I'm still here, listening to this crap. I'm outta here," Tony said, heading for the door.

"So does that mean you don't want to hear what time you're up?" Martin said.

Tony stopped. "Okay, I'll bite. Just when do I need to start looking out for Mr. Tall, Dark and Deadly?"

Martin concentrated. "Okay, let's see. First it was that circus guy, and then that streaker, Arianna. After that, it was Reggie, and then it was Tony. Next came Jason and his mom, Danielle, was it? After that, it was you, Linda. Then it was Carl, and then Jessie, and finally, me." Martin stopped and looked at the crowd, but they didn't seem to be taking it as he had hoped.

Reggie started to laugh. "Cool! I get to go out right after the streaker!"

"Lucky!" Carl said.

"Okay, so I'm dying after the druggie. I'll keep tabs on how much I care," Tony said as he, Carl and Reggie left the building.

"What is wrong with you guys?" Martin said. "All of you could be dead in the next week, and you don't even care!"

"Stop it!" Danielle yelled. "My Jason's already shaken enough by the accident, and now you're talking about everybody dying! I can't expose Jason to this kind of craziness!" And with that, she escorted her son out of Martin's home, leaving Jesse, Linda and Roger.

"Well, you guys believe me, don't you?" Martin said.

"Let me put it this way," Jesse said. "One year ago, my beautiful wife passed away. Three months ago, both of my children died. Now, I appreciate you saving me, but I lost $50,000 at that game, and, quite frankly, I would prefer dying at this point. So, I know you're right when you say that I'm going to die soon, but I neither know nor care about anybody else." And with that, he left.

"I believe you, kid," Roger said. "Even if I didn't, I owe you and Tony one, and I might as well help you out."

"Thanks, Roger. What about you, Linda?"

"I'm your sister! I have to stick with you on this, and if you say we have to save the streaker, let's save the streaker!" Linda said.

"Thanks, Linda. That means a lot to me," Martin said sarcastically.

"No problem. Say, where exactly is this girl?" asked Linda.

"That…I do not know," Martin said. "I actually didn't think about that part."

"No problem," Roger said. "I can figure that out."

"How?"

"You forget, I work at the football stadium. I still have access to all the computers, cameras, and the tickets. I can just check the cameras to figure out the people's seats, match their seats with their tickets, get their names, and get their phone numbers from that."

Linda looked at him curiously. "How would you-"

"Security guards are federal workers, so we have access to some federal files."

"Oh."

"The whole process should take about six hours. Why don't you guys go to bed, I'll type it up, and we meet at, say, the Westborough Mall at 10:00 a.m. tomorrow?"

"I don't know," Martin said. "That's a long time. Who knows what might happen before then?"

"Oh, come on, big bro. Even Death has to sleep sometime, and we're no different. See you later, I'm going home." And with that, Linda and Roger both left.

Martin stayed up late that night, researching the previous scenarios, calculating, thinking, and working on a way to solve their predicament. However, each time his research showed the same result: death, sooner than later.

I can't accept that, Martin thought. I have a responsibility to those people, and I can't just let them die.

But how can I save them? How could I possibly prevent their deaths not just once, but as many times as it takes?

What if I can't save them?

And what if, when my number is up, there's nobody to save me?