Wow, I am just super surprised and excited by the amazing reception that my little story has received after only a day! You guys are awesome! It was a slow day at work today, so here's Chapter 2 for everyone!
Also just a quick author's note: I probably should have explained this from the beginning, but this story is supposed to take place several years before the events of the movie itself. Knowing that will make this chapter make much more sense! Hope you enjoy!
"What?!" Becca exclaimed in surprise. "N-No, that can't be – this can't be real," she attempted to justify. There was still a chance this was just an elaborate dream.
"Oh, it's real alright – mira!" the man grabbed her wrist and held her hand up in front of her face.
What met her gaze was nothing but bone. It was as if all of the skin and flesh had been ripped off her hand. Becca's eyes went wide with shock. She brought the other hand up to her gaze, it looked exactly the same. She frantically ripped the sleeves of her hoodie up around her elbows. Her arms were nothing but bone. She looked down, bony feet were wearing her sandals. She stumbled backwards, falling on her butt in the process.
Becca's breathing began to increase with panic. None of this made any sense. It wasn't physically possible! "What's happening to me?!" she demanded. How could she not have noticed this before? Maybe because it had been so dark?
"It's what happens when you die. You think that's bad, you should see your face," the man chuckled.
Becca cautiously reached up to feel her face. She couldn't really feel it in the traditional sense, but she could tell that the soft squish of her round cheeks was gone. There wasn't anything left except hard mandible.
Well, that was just about all she could handle. She'd reached her breaking point. Becca felt her eyes roll back in her head, and once again, everything went dark.
"Jorge!" The skeleton woman snapped, smacking him in the back of the head. "That was muy mala! Can't you see she's already scared enough without you teasing her?" she lectured.
"Lo siento, Maria, but she's going to have to figure it out eventually," he reasoned.
"You couldn't explain more gently?" she pressed him. His response was just to shrug.
"Well, let's get her inside. We won't be able to process her until she wakes up."
Some time later, Becca could feel herself start to come to. She slowly opened her eyes to find an unfamiliar ceiling above her. Her foggy mind tried to piece together the events that brought her here. Had it been a dream? Well, there was one way to find out. She slowly lifted her hand up in front of her face, and then flinched when she saw her skeleton instead of a normal hand, once again.
She felt her breath catch in her throat, but she forced herself to swallow it down. She couldn't afford to freak out now, not until she knew she was safe.
Becca carefully pushed herself up, trying to avoid making any noise. She realized that someone had put some chairs together and laid her across them as a makeshift bed. She rolled down onto her hand and knees and peered around. She appeared to be in some kind of office, completely with computer, desk, and lamp in the corner. And as far as she could tell, she was alone in the room.
There were some windows on her left. She crept towards them, lifting herself so she could just make out what was on the other side through the bottom of the window. It looked like the inside of your stereotypical generic business. There were skeleton people sitting at desks – typing away at computers or writing on papers.
What was she doing here? She couldn't possibly understand what they would want with her? Did they have child services in the afterlife if kids died before their parents or something? Either way, she didn't want to stick around to find out! She'd heard horror stories about foster care from some of the kids at her school.
Becca threw her hood up over her head and made her way over to the door. She carefully opened it and stuck her head out. There was another door just across the way that looked like it might lead outside. If only she could make it there without getting spotted.
Keeping low to the ground, Becca snuck along the floor, trying to keep as quiet as possible. The soft sounds of chatter and beeping machinery reached her ears. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. So far so good. As the door got closer, she had to fight the urge to jump up and make a dash for it. That would certainly draw unwanted attention.
Three feet – two feet – just inches away. She was so close!
Suddenly, there was startling cry that shattered the air. "Jorge! Jorge! She's gone!"
All eyes turned towards the room that Becca had just come from, including hers. A man, who she recognized from before, burst out of the room and pointed at her.
"Somebody stop that girl! Rápido!" he shouted in her direction.
Well, so much for stealth! Becca leapt up and grabbed for the door handle. She threw herself through the doorway as quickly as she could. She ran through another small hallway before entering a lobby area with large, glass doors at the end. She pushed her way through those doors, looking back for just a fraction of a second to see several skeletons hot on her tail.
The main doors to the building lead out into a plaza type area that was bustling with activity. Skeletons of every shape and size mingled and moved around, going about their daily business, not paying the slightest bit of attention to Becca. She realized this was her chance! She dove into the middle of the crowd, weaving around skirts and ducking under legs. She didn't know where she was running to, all she knew was she wanted to get away from her pursuers!
"Niña! Niña wait! We never learned your name!" She heard one voice from behind her say.
"We're only trying to help you find your familia!" Another shouted.
Yeah right! She knew practically next to nothing about Spanish, but she knew what that meant. Her "familia" was still alive, which meant she'd be going to a fake "familia". No way was she going to let that happen!
"Hey!" a third voice exclaimed right next to her. Probably someone she'd bumped into by accident. She didn't have time to turn to see who it was. Not that it really mattered, anyway.
As she was running, a particularly large group of skeleton people began to pass between her and those chasing her. Becca looked to her side and spied a stairwell with a hollow interior shrouded in darkness. She saw her opportunity and veered off her current path towards it. She ducked and slid under the stairs, and then flipped around to peer out from the dark. She watched with relief as they continued to run past and disappeared from sight.
So – now what? She'd lost who she thought were the bad people here, but, who were the good ones? Were there even any? She watched for a while as skeleton after skeleton passed by her hiding place. They all looked like monsters to her, but then she glanced back down at her own hands. She should probably stop calling them that, seeing as how she was a monster now too!
The thought brought her sorrow back to her, and she readjusted to a sitting position, pulling her knees up to her chest. She took one last look at her bony hands before pulling the sleeves of her hoodie down over them. Then Becca buried her face in her knees, and sobbed.
Another day – another death, and another addition to the eternal fiesta of the afterlife. A popular saying when you called 'The Land of the Dead' your home. However, for Héctor, it was more like another day – and a little more of him died inside.
His precious Coco was getting old. There was no telling how much longer her memory was going to last, let alone her life. He had spent years trying to find a way to scam his way across that stupid petal bridge. Every year on Dia de los Muertos he would try, and every year it ended in another failed attempt. He had all but given up hope of ever seeing her again, in the living world, or this one.
He was wandering around the plaza that lead to the bridges, a favorite place of his to hang out. Sometimes it was to try and devise new ways of tricking the gate staff, other times it was just to watch the new arrivals. Perhaps another member of the family that disowned him might come in today. It was better than doing nothing and letting himself waste away.
A sudden commotion ahead snapped him out of his stupor. Several of the gate staff were frantically running in his direction. They seemed to be chasing someone.
"We're only trying to help you find your familia!" he heard one of them shout, apparently to the person that they were chasing.
He felt a bit confused. Why would anyone run from the gate staff?
He didn't have too long to wonder before he saw a black, hooded figure push its way through the crowd. Looked almost like a miniature grim reaper. The figure bumped into him as it desperately tried to scramble away.
"Hey!" he hollered in protest, but they didn't stop, or even hesitate for that matter. He studied the retreating form, and on closer inspection saw that it was just a child in a black hooded sweater.
A few moments later the gate staff then came barreling past, in hot pursuit of the run away kid. Curiosity getting the better of him, Héctor decided to follow along to try and find out what was going on. He made his way around the crowd, skirting the edge to attempt to keep the kid in sight. They were suddenly separated by a large mariachi group that blocked the gate staff from following the kid further.
He quickly moved around the group just in time to see the small figure duck under a nearby stair case. The group of pursuers, not seeing where their quarry had gone, hurriedly continued forward until he could no longer see them. Once they had gone, only then did the kid poke it's head out to look around.
"Huh, well, aren't you clever?" he muttered to himself. He walked a few paces closer, trying to look at nonchalant as possible, until her could get a better look at the face.
He had been right! Under the hood was a young girl. He didn't think she was even old enough to be a teenager yet. It made him wonder what had happened. How did she end up here? Although – perhaps he didn't actually want to know. It was always a sad thing, to see kids coming through the gate.
However, the main question that still pressed on his mind – why was she running and trying to hide in the first place? She looked terrified, her wide eyes darting around and staring at all the people passing by. No one seemed to care to pay much attention to her, but that wasn't too surprising. After all, if she wasn't 'remembered', then no one around here was going to want to associate with her. He knew all too well what that was like.
He considered going over and asking her himself, but he wasn't sure how she was going to react. Would she just run from him too? Probably. . .
After another few moments of contemplation, he decided to give it up. He was sure that somebody would find her eventually, or she would find them, and it would all be taken care of. None of it was really his concern anyway. Besides, he still had a full day of sulking ahead of him.
Becca sat near the stairwell for – she didn't even know how long. It was hard to tell the passing of time here. It could have been hours, it could have been days. She wasn't sure, but at some point she finally did get tired of crying.
Survival instinct told her that she couldn't just sit there forever, that eventually she'd need to find food and water. However, the longer she sat, the more she realized that she didn't seem to have those needs any more. What was she thinking? Of course not, she was dead after all! She didn't need to eat or drink, use the bathroom, or even sleep it seemed. The whole time she was sitting there, she never experienced even the slightest urge at all. It was the strangest sensation – like she could just sit there for the rest of eternity and never need anything ever again.
Except for one thing – she did start to feel very lonely, and watching all of the groups of people passing in front of her, chatting and laughing together, didn't help. Even so, she also began to grow very bored, so lacking any other kind of stimulation, she just continued to stare at all of the passersby. Most of them were adults, but occasionally she'd spot another kid, obviously taken way before their time.
The longer she watched, the more she began to detect a common theme with them all. It seemed as though they all had accents, all could speak Spanish, even their clothes all looked very similar. It was like literally everyone here was Hispanic in some way, if not just straight up Mexican.
Was this what the Mexican side of her family would call – The Land of the Dead? She didn't know very much about it besides the holiday that coincided with it: Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead). And all she knew about that was that it came after Halloween, and people liked to paint their faces like skulls. Maybe all of the hype around the holiday wasn't so far-fetched after all. . .
A million questions began to race around in her mind. If this place actually existed, but only Hispanic people could come here, then what about all the other races on Earth? Did each culture have their own afterlife? And if that was the case, what was she doing here? Shouldn't she have gone to an American afterlife? Was it because of where she'd died? She wasn't sure, but she couldn't shake the feeling that she really didn't belong here.