Chapter Eleven
The orbit of the Earth halted to a dead stop.
Time cracked into jagged shards and froze mid fall. Colors became muted, and everything ever so slightly smeared, becoming out of focus and grainy.
Tony blinked. His mouth opened, then closed again. And, for once in his life, he had absolutely no idea of what to say.
He squeezed his eyes tightly shut then sprang them open. This was…unbelievable. This was like a movie, and in another first, Tony really didn't want to think about movies at that moment. He peered around, hoping for some sort of shred of reality to anchor himself to, and realized that he was staring at their table. At himself and Tim.
Tony peered closer at himself (Damn, he was good-looking, but then wasn't the time. Even Tony knew that). He focused on his own face and violently drew backward. There was a look of frozen shock on his face, eyes staring at where his and Tim's hands were forcefully joined, lips ever so slightly parted in the beginning of what was either a protest or a scream. He couldn't tell. Tim looked wan and ill. He almost didn't look alive, shadows pooling in eye cavities and under cheekbones, like a skull.
He mouthed exclamations that made no sense anywhere outside of his head (Which was now a few feet away), and then realized he wasn't breathing. Panic, held at bay for too long by recently battered defenses, burst through, flooding his senses. It was clear breathing was no longer a necessity, but he could feel the panic, icy in his chest cavity where no heartbeat.
I knew this wasn't a good idea, Tony.
The words bypassed the usual, ho-hum vibrating the eardrum route, and instead were directly imprinted into his brain. He could taste the letters, like a combination of dried lilac petals and antiseptic, heavy on his tongue. Slapped away from his panic by the words, Tony turned slowly, deer in headlights look firmly fixed onto his face. A hand unconsciously rose and clamped firmly onto his chest.
Don't worry, I'm shielding myself from your soul. It won't be like last time.
A pause.
I hope.
The hand didn't move.
"McGee? T-Tim?" Tony said shakily, without need of breath. The skeleton slowly cocked its head to the side. Green glinted deep within the endless eye sockets at the name.
No. Yes. Sort of.
It paused.
It's kind of complicated.
Another long pause.
How do I look?
"How do you-you look like a damn skeleton! With the cloak and…and the scythe." The scythe shone in the nonexistent light, as if to acknowledge him finally taking notice of its presence. Tony glanced away from it. He wasn't fond of the impression that inanimate objects were laughing silently at him. (Oh, God, he'd really gone off the deep end.)
Interesting.
Tony gave him a bewildered look. There was a movement that was, apparently, supposed to be a shrug. It rippled unnaturally through the dark cloth of his cloak. For a moment, Tony swore he could see the barest shadow of wings, before they vanished.
You see what you expect to see.
Death then looked at the shadowy flowers. He hesitated, glanced at Tony and then back to the flowers. Death cracked his finger bones. The sound was of a million coffin tops snapping closed.
Come.
Tony felt a slight shift within his chest. Death raised one skeletal hand to Tony, and pushed, fleshless palm facing toward him. The shifting settled. The scythe moved so fast that Tony only caught a blur of light streaking toward the flowers. He felt his soul shrink back, like a small bird, within the cage of his ribs.
An identical image of the flowers separated from their real counterpart, ethereal, glowing a dull blue that made Tony's eyes water. A feeling of wrongness dripped into him at the sight, but he didn't look away. It approached Death's outstretched hand like a wild animal, hesitant, movement halting. The hand curled gently around the image as it settled onto its palm, and the glow was snuffed out. It was horrific and beautiful at the same time.
The skull slowly turned to face him. The pure agelessness of Death flapped above Tony's head and slowly settled, like a thick wool blanket, like layers of sky, upon him. Tony grunted and bent double under the sudden weight of time, though there was no pain. With a monumental amount of effort, he straightened the best he could and stared down Death.
Do you see them, Tony?
"See what?"
The souls. The millions of souls, stars in the darkness. And I am the light switch.
"I don't see them." Tony swallowed and, with the words, I've got a bad feeling about this, courtesy of Harrison Ford at his Han Solo best, echoing through his head, said, "Show me."
Death turned sharply to fully face him.
Tony-
"Who is the senior field agent here, McDeath?" Tony stood firmly, arms folded across his chest, not caring that he was wrinkling his suit. "Hurry it up, my DVD of Dirty Dancing is waiting eagerly for me at home." He cocked an eyebrow and gave Death a small smirk, his in-charge smirk. Oh my God. I've just attempted to pull rank on Death. The immortal's head tilted ever so slightly to the side, there was something so Probie McGee about the action that Tony's smile deepened into something more genuine, relief at something familiar soothing the off-kilter feeling.
Tony blinked and then shut his eyes hard as his they went involuntarily out of focus. He opened them and blinked hard. Tim and Death stood before him, the same, but different. It was like double vision, like being drunk but without the pleasant numbness of alcohol.
"Okay." They said. "Tell me when you've had enough."
Then, without further clarification, they reached out a single finger and pressed it to Tony's forehead. His eyes opened.
"Hell!"
It was like someone had turned on a floodlight in a den of moles. The picture was burned into his corneas. Souls shone blindingly from all over the restaurant, and Tony realized that even he was emitting a pure white light.
But it wasn't just that, he could feel them, feel the power as they undulated, feel them as they slowly whittled their time away. He could hear them too, like lilting music, without pattern, without beat. Anguish and contentedness danced with sadness and pain, while joy waltzed with exhaustion nearby. They reached out wispy tendrils to cling to him and he stumbled out of their grasp, overwhelmed.
His awareness expanded beyond the restaurant, slowly encompassing the country. Billions of souls pinged into existence, triggering the fall of grains of sand in the hourglass. A shrill, inhuman screaming wormed its way into his ears, streaming through the folds of his brain. He wondered who was screaming, maybe he was. Or maybe no one was at all.
Tony screwed his eyes tightly shut, tears beginning to involuntarily ink between the lids, but couldn't close off the clamor of souls, and the constant screech, spilling into his head at a worrying rate.
Then, there was Death, an anomaly, negative space, utter and complete silence that pressed into Tony's ears, past the eardrums, into the crevices of his brain. Inked into his mouth and eyes, suffocating, slowly creeping through veins to curl around the still heart.
It was too much.
Tony trembled, on the verge of complete collapse. We're talking mushroom cloud bad. Flames. Shock wave. The whole shebang. He dropped to his knees, unable to hold himself up. A pain that he had never felt before was building in the formerly painless existence, swelling inside him, sloshing against the walls. The sudden change was agonizing. He could see himself fading, the light he emitted dimming in a truly alarming way.
He made a strangled noise that caught and tangled haphazardly in his throat, shredding as it was pushed through clenched teeth. It sounded very much like, "Arrghredamfushitstoptim!" Tears dribbled down translucent cheeks.
Then, the overwhelming sensations began to drain away, like a spigot had been pressed into his cranium and the flood let loose. The slight pressure on his forehead was drawn away, and Tony sat upon his legs and just shook for a moment, eyes glassy, in, what he faintly hoped was, quiet dignity. Death drew back his hand.
I'm so sorry.
The hand glided forward again, this time joined by its twin. They both smoothly began to draw intricate, impossible patterns just above Tony's head. Relief weaved its way into his system. Cracks that he had never been aware of sealed themselves back together, scars faded, darkness became light.
"What are you doing?" He asked hoarsely.
Repairing your soul. I…I didn't realize it was this damaged.
Tony could taste the sharp, salty guilt of these last words, and pressed his lips tightly together.
No…don't think that.
Came a strained statement. Tony carefully avoided Death's gaze.
It doesn't mean that you're a bad person, Tony. It just means you've experienced more…damaging events than most people have.
A pause.
And I didn't help that.
The flow of relief tapered off. The skull looked at him, the spark of green deep in the night of its eye sockets glowing brighter than ever, flickering wildly.
…You're a very good person, Tony. One of the…um, the best I've ever met.
The sheepishness of the words tasted like popcorn, Tony decided fuzzily, an infusion of butter, a tinge of salt, perhaps a hint of sugar? Honesty. Unwavering belief, and regret. Sadness.
"Is…that what you feel all the time?" Tony questioned finally, the slight slur of his words phasing out by the end of the query. He made a half-hearted gesture with a hand. "All those souls…?"
Yes.
"Even when you're…McGee?"
Always. I'd be worried if I couldn't.
There was a sharp, serious smile in the words that jabbed forward. Like gritted teeth, tears glittering like fallen stars in eyes, a shining blade rushing forth. Like a stiletto between ribs, with a hushed apology curling in the ear as the back arched forward. There was a very long pause. Then, just as another question was plucked from the raw film strips that were Tony's mind, two words were stamped into his consciousness.
Brace yourself.
"What-"
Both bone and flesh pressed to his forehead.
A switch flicked.