Coronasona Writings

Stop. Get Some Help pt.1

Jackson Signal had never visited his grave before. He had considered it when he first died, but by the time his funeral happened, he had already skipped town. The reality of his death had already set in over a decade ago, but seeing his name on a tombstone was surreal.
    Jackson hadn't intended to come here, but he had. His legs had subconsciously carried him to his "final resting place". Fitting considering the situation. He only needed to get some fresh air. He needed to get out of his ex-boyfriend's apartment.
    Jackson sat down in front of his grave and buried his head in his hands. Maybe it was fitting he was visiting his own grave, since he had finally found out who put him there.
It was an accident. He knew that. Jackson knew that. Rarely anyone crashes a ship on purpose, and even less would do so for the chance of killing a small town radio host with crazy conspiracies. But knowing it was an accident didn't mean it hurt any less, if anything it hurt more.
Jackson could understand having an alibi, but not lying to someone close to you over something you couldn't control? That just made no sense.
Jackson just wished he could have avoided this whole thing. He wished he never found out, or maybe that he never started dating Alaster, or maybe that he didn't exist at all. Things were a lot easier when he was a simple ghost. At the moment he was pretty sure he'd give up most anything to go back to that.
He felt hot tears welling up in his eyes again, and tried desperately to push them back, but it was to no avail.
Jackson tried to wipe away his tears, but nearly took out an eye with his claws. Great. Another thing to go wrong. He wasn't quite sure when he shifted into a full demon, but it was probably during the fight.
Demons. That gave Jackson an idea. He finished wiping away his tears and spoke.
    "Bazollon. Bazollon. Bazollon."
    The ground split forth with the fury of hell, sending nearby graves tumbling into the fiery depths.
    Jackson scooted back until his back was up against his tombstone, just narrowly avoiding falling in. The ground shook beneath him as a shadowy, humanoid figure flew up from the cavern.
She landed on the ground and the shadows began to dissolve, revealing her light blue-ish skin and dark purple hair up in a neat bun. She pushed up her square rimmed glasses and peered down at Jackson from behind their lenses.
    She checked the clipboard in her hand and looked back at him.
    "Jackson Signal." she stated coldly, "minor radio demon. Overdue for a meeting by about 5 years."
    Jackson laughed nervously. "Uh yeah... sorry about that. I'm so bad at my job. Maybe you should just fire me."
    Bazollon, the demon, quirked an eyebrow. "I'm not following."
    "Well I uh," Jackson stood up and dusted off his pants. "I've been a really crappy demon, so it would make sense if you fired me, gave me back my soul, and let me live on as a ghost?" he said, leaning away slightly in case she blew up at him.
    Much to Jackson's surprise, Bazollon didn't blow up. She simply laughed. It was a short, curt laugh, but it still happened.
    "That's not how any of this works." she said, gesturing around with her free hand. "You made a deal. That's not the kind of thing that can be easily reversed."
    "Well obviously, but selling my soul wasn't exactly easy either." he replied,
    "You can't return a soul, especially not since you still technically have it." Bazollon said, rubbing her temples, "i don't even know why you thought i'd entertain this considering I get nothing out of it."
    "Baz, if I may call you that--"
    "You may not."
    "Alright, Lonnie, I can offer you like 20 bucks? Whatever information I've got?" Jackson offered, summoning his microphone and extending it towards her.
Lonnie let out a deep, tired sigh. "That doesn't count. I need a soul, Mr. Signal. That's what the deal was for."
"But--"
"No."
    "Fine!" Jackson said, "Take my [static] soul then! Just get me off this ride!" he said, shoving the microphone into her hands.
    Lonnie stopped and stared for a moment, looking between the microphone and Jackson. She tilted her head slightly before pushing up her glasses again and tucking the microphone neatly under her arm.
    "I take it something happened?" she asked, her clipboard materializing once more. She clicked her pen once and began to write.
    Jackson shrugged, slightly taken aback. "I uh-" he took a deep breath. He didn't need more tears right now. "Kind of yeah. It's crazy actually I found out--"
    She held up a finger and interrupted him.
"Sometimes life is like a sad orphan. It sucks to hear because it only makes you sad. And it keeps annoying you. And others guilt you for not improving the sad orphan. And you want to stop that darn orphan from complaining. Like, we get it! Things suck! Just suck it up I don't care!" Lonnie stopped herself with a sigh and pushed her glasses up. "Sorry. The metaphor got away from me there. What was I saying?"
    "Uuuh, life?" Jackson said, not quite sure how to react.
    She sighed again. "Right. I don't give a [static] about your personal life. Have a nice night." She smiled and turned to leave.
"No!" Jackson exclaimed, throwing out a hand. The microphone under Lonnie's arm shook and then flew into his hand. Lonnie spun around to face him, her pupils growing thinner.
Jackson drew in a nervous breath before speaking. "I'm sorry I just- Isn't there anything you can do?"
Lonnie's eyes turned pitch black as she pivoted on her heel to face him. "Mr. Signal." she growled. "I think you have a drastic misunderstanding of this dynamic."
She took a few steps towards him, her fists clenched and her clipboard nowhere in sight.
"Your job is to be my eyes and ears on earth," she stated, coming at him faster now. "And you haven't been able to do a good job on the one thing you claimed to be good at."
Jackson dropped his mic and stumbled backwards as he tried to get away from Lonnie.
    She picked up the fallen microphone and sneered at it. "You had one job, Jackson Signal. Report. The thing you dedicated your life to. That was it"
    She looked him over and crinkled up her nose. "And you couldn't even do that."
    With that, she snapped the microphone in two on her knee. Sparks flew out of it and Lonnie caught them in her fist, causing it to spark to life.
    With lightning speed she snatched his tie and pushed him up against the graveyard tree. She raised her crackling hand towards his face.
    Jackson looked around frantically for some sort of help, but the graveyard was empty.
    Lonnie roughly grabbed his jaw with her crackling hand, sending sparks up into his skull as she pulled his face to the side to make eye contact with her. It was an uncomfortably familiar situation.
    "Listen close Signal because i'm only going to say this once," she growled. "I am in charge here, not you. You'll be done when I am satisfied with your work and then you'll go burn in hell for eternity. Do you understand?"
    Jackson tried to nod, but Lonnie only dug her sharp nails deeper into his jaw.
    "I understand," he choked out, wincing as more electricity shot into his face.
    She pulled back and straightened out her hair, her eyes fading back to normal.
Jackson raised his hand to his face and ran it over his jaw to check the damage, but quickly pulled it away as it made the stinging pain worse.
Lonnie's clipboard and pen materialized in her hand again as she scribbled something down. She tucked her clipboard under her arm and double-clicked her pen. It began to grow in size, morphing into a long, bladed spear-like weapon.
    "Oh and Mr. Signal?" she said, "a parting gift, to remember our time here."
    And with that, she swung at him, cutting into his chest and sending burning pain shooting through his body. He let out a screech and fell to the ground, not used to how pain felt.
    Now satisfied, Lonnie disappeared her pen and clipboard, pivoted on her heel, and walked back towards the large cavern in the middle of the graveyard. She stepped over the edge and vanished. The ground rumbled as the pit slowly closed behind her, leaving only Jackson and his injuries.
    He slumped to the ground and held a hand to his chest. After a few moments, he could feel blood starting to seep through his shirt and he started to panic. He hadn't bled since before he died. He hadn't gotten injured since he died for that matter!
Was he going to die again? Was it going to stick this time? Was this the end?
He could feel the ever-familiar static creeping into his head, jumbling up his surroundings and making it impossible to think. Was this really it? He didn't have the brain power left to come up with answers.
The last thing Jackson heard was a high-pitched screech.
Then everything faded to static.