Death's Hunt

Chapter 3

I looked at the girl in front of me. She was in pretty bad shape already. Honestly if it hadn’t been for the heart monitor telling me otherwise, I would have thought she was already dead. Both of her arms were missing. She had scratches and bruises all over her body.
“How are you still alive?” I mumbled to myself as I walked up to her. As I got closer, I saw why Anga’s CO2 had not killed her. It seemed she had an oxygen mask strapped to her face. I simply stood next to the bed for a few minutes, wondering what I should do. I looked at the oxygen mask for a second. “I simply could cut it off and let Anga’s CO2 finish her off,” I thought, “or I guess I could just wait for someone else to come by and do the job.” I put my index finger and thumb over my eyes as I thought. “I could have my friends eat her. Maybe I can just pretend like she never existed?” But I still knew that really in the end I would have to do this myself.
I raised one of my hands. “Just a quick slash to the throat is all I need to do.” I was breathing heavily as I took aim, my bloodred eyes burning like the coals in a fire. But when I looked down and saw her, I drove my claws into the wall. “I can’t do this!” I started to walk back towards the door but decided to take one last glance at her. I was shocked by what I saw. Her eyes were open, and she was looking towards me. Since I had not expected anyone to still be alive, I had not stayed in my spirit form which meant she could see me. The two of us simply stared at one another. Finally, the girl spoke in a weak voice, “I knew you would come.” One of the perks of being a Death is that you can understand any language, even those you have never heard. I didn’t say anything back. I mean, I was too stunned by this turn of events.
“You’re death, right?” she asked. I simply nodded in reply. She lightly laughed before speaking again. “You don’t look like the way people describe you.”
I finally said something. I don’t know why I said it, it just came out, “Yes, well, there’s more to me than meets the eye.”
She began to cough slightly. By now, I had made my way back to the head of the bed.
“What’s your name?” I asked, my shadow looming over her.
“Chiyoko,” she replied.
“Well then. How old are you?”
“Eight,” she managed to sputter out through her coughing fit.
“You know Chiyoko, most people in your condition would already be dead.”
“Am I not already dead?”
“Just because you can see me, doesn’t mean you have transitioned just yet. As I was saying, most people would have given up by now. So tell me, how come you’re still here?”
She looked at me for a few seconds before replying, “I’m not ready.”
“Not ready for what?”
“I’m not ready to die. I don’t want to go.”
I could see a tear forming in the corner of her eye. “Do you mind if I put my hand on your chest?” I asked.
She didn’t really answer. She only gave a quick nod of approval. As soon as I laid my hand on her, I felt her soul thrashing around, trying to escape its mortal confines. Well, I’ll be. Anga was right! But why did it have to be her? As I took my hand off, I sat at the foot of her bed and looked at her. The room fell silent for a few minutes before I told her what I was thinking.
“Chiyoko.”
“Yes?”
“I can’t leave this place without you; however, you don’t have to leave me.”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“I’ll make it quick.” Before she could say anything else, I drove my tail straight into her heart. As soon as the hole was made, her soul leapt out at me. I quickly grabbed it and held it firmly in my hands. This wasn’t my first time dealing with these type of souls. Using my tail to restrain her, I exited the hospital room and entered the main hallway. There I saw Anga and Vlagor waiting for me. As soon as they saw me with the restless soul, they began cheering.
“All right Kakrix! You did it!” Anga yelled in excitement.
“You did well my friend,” Vlagor added while patting me on the back. Well, more slapped than patted, but I understood the gesture. I didn’t say anything. All I did was whistle, and the monster birds came flying back into my body.
“See, that is why I wanted you to come with me!” Anga exclaimed. “I knew if anyone could find that restless soul, it would be you! When we get back, everything is on the house!”
I didn’t say anything. I just spread my wings and flew out of the building, leaving a huge hole in one of the windows as I did so. As I flew through the mist and headed back towards my world, I could feel the soul still wrapped in my tail changing shape. I knew what was happening. She was taking form. Once I finally got through the fog and landed, I released Chiyoko as she fell to the ground. I stood beside her body while I waited for her to regain consciousness. As I waited, I took note of her new appearance. She still had the same skin colour and black hair, and I noticed that she still didn’t have arms. It was just her torso and legs. Her feet now looked like those of a bird of prey. “That’s probably her main weapon,” I thought. Instead of the hospital gown from before, she was now wearing a kimono, albeit without sleeves or even holes for her non-existent arms. I used my tail to flip her onto her back, exposing another surprise. She had gotten an extra pair of eyes. As I kept looking at her, she suddenly gasped before her eyes shot open.
“Welcome back,” I bluntly stated.
Chiyoko looked at me, clearly confused. “What… what happened? Where am I? Why do I feel so different?”
I knelt down to her height and placed a hand on her shoulder, “Chiyoko, calm down. I will explain everything, but first I need you to get up and follow me.” As I said that, I started helping her to her feet. Her legs must have still been weak as she fell down the first few times she tried to walk. Eventually, she got frustrated.
“Just tell me what is going on!” she yelled out while lying there on the ground.
“I will, but you must first get up,” I roughly told her.
That’s when she revealed her other weapon. Screaming in frustration, she sent a shock wave that nearly knocked me off my feet and caused the surrounding plants to shake as if they were in a hurricane. “TELL ME WHAT’S GOING ON!” By now, she was crying. I could see that I had pushed her too far.
“All right, all right. I will tell you.” I sat down next to her, wrapping my tail around her waist in a feeble attempt to comfort her. “Listen Chiyoko, my name is Kakrix and I am Death, but I am not alone. There are many, many other deaths out there and you are now one of them.”
Her long locks of hair covered her face as she cried. “What do you mean?” she finally asked.
“I’ll explain to you what happened…” But before I could say anything else, Vlagor came crashing through the trees.
“Why did you fly off without us?” he asked confused.
“Vlagor, I’m not in the mood for this.”
“Not in the mood my sweet a…” Anga burst out.
“Anga, watch your language,” I growled not letting her finish her thought, especially since Chiyoko still had the mindset of an eight-year-old girl. I suddenly felt her move behind me. I could feel her body trembling in fright. “It’s okay Chiyoko. You can trust them.” She peeked out behind me but didn’t go any further. They were not giving the best first impression. “I’ll explain to you in detail what happened, just follow me,” I told Chiyoko as I helped her stand up. When she finally managed to keep her balance, the four of us began walking back to Anga’s bar.
Once we got there and sat down at the counter, I began explaining to Chiyoko what had happened to her and how this world worked. “You see Chiyoko, there are two types of souls in this world. There are those who just accept their death, like this one,” I said revealing a white orb in my hand.
“I’ll take that,” Anga interrupted me while taking the soul to prepare it for food.
“And then there are souls like yours,” I continued.
“What do you mean by that?” she enquired.
“I’ll take it from here, Kakrix,” Vlagor announced. “You see little one, souls like ours refuse death, and they continue to refuse it until they are brought to this place, or until their refusal of death is reversed.”
“I don’t think I understand,” Chiyoko replied.
“What he means is that a death can only be created when a soul is restless. If you had stayed in the mortal realm, your soul could have calmed down and become just one of those orbs. But because I brought your restless soul into the realm of death, you became a death yourself.”
“But what if I don’t want to be that?”
I simply sighed. Anga came back and placed four plates on the counter before joining us and saying, “Well, Chiyoko, that’s just not how this world works. Once you’re a death, that’s it – you’re a death. No take backs. I still do not understand that expression though.”
“It might have to do with the fact that this expression was created after you died,” Vlagor offered.
“As you can see, we still retain our mortal personalities,” I mumbled exasperated while hiding my face into my hands. I then looked directly at Chiyoko, “Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it.”
“There is just one thing I still don’t understand.” The three of us looked at her slightly puzzled. “If you really did gas the hospital, why wasn’t anyone alerted to your presence?”
“Well that would be because we don’t follow the same rules as on the mortal plane of existence,” Anga stated. “To put it simply, mortals can’t sense us, unless we want to be heard, seen, or anything like that.”
“Da, you know those mysteries in your world? Missing people, unexplained deaths, those kinds of things. Chances are it was a death who made sure it wasn’t seen,” Vlagor added.
“I have only one more question…”
“What is it?” I asked.
“Why do we all look so different? I mean, all three of you look nothing alike.”
“That has to do with the way we died,” I mumbled.
“Well, it’s not just how we die,” Anga explained. “It also has to do with what our last mortal form was and the events leading up to our death. All these different things will affect how you look in this world. I mean, look at me. I was a miner’s wife a long time ago in 1936. But you see one day, my husband went missing in the mine. Now, most of the miners’ wives would have simply stayed at home and worried, but not me. No way! I was always more of a… what’s the word they use these days?” she asked looking at me.
“A tomboy?” I answered.
“Yes, that’s it. That’s what it is. Either way, instead of just waiting at home, I decided to go down to the mines and look for him. Unfortunately, there were CO2 pockets down in the mines and because of a cave-in, I got trapped in one. That’s when I really wished I had a flame, then I would have died quickly. Instead, I suffocated to death, but I was so determined to find my husband that my soul became restless. That’s when one of the deaths found me and brought me here.”
“But what about your cheeks?” Chiyoko asked.
“That… That only happened because I scraped my face against the rocks in the mine while I was looking for my husband.”
“So you’re saying that I look like this because of my accident? And I don’t have any arms because of it?”
“That’s correct,” Anga stated.
Chiyoko looked down at her food for a second before asking a question that I was expecting. “Why do you two look the way you do?” she asked looking at Vlagor and I.
“Well, I was a Neanderthal 22,000 years ago, give or take.”
“Vlagor, look at me,” I said interrupting him. He couldn’t maintain eye contact which was no surprise.
“All right, all right, fine. It was 22,000 years ago but I was a Cro-Magnon not a Neanderthal.”
“He only says he was a Neanderthal because it sounds more interesting,” Anga whispered.
“Either way, the reason I look like this is because a cave bear killed me. But it was an amazing battle.”
“The bear swatted your head clean off,” I stated.
“Yes, but I still killed it.”
“The bear falling on your spear doesn’t count as you killing it!”
“Oh yes… well, at least, I still fought a bear! Either way, that is why I look like a half-man, half-bear,” Vlagor quickly finished, hoping to change the subject.
“What about you Kakrix?” Chiyoko asked. My blood ran cold at that question. My claws left huge scratches in the counter. My eyes flared up. My tail waved around like an enraged viper. I looked to both my left and right. I saw Anga and Vlagor look at me with pure terror and Chiyoko seemed like she was on the verge of tears. Seeing this made me calm down. I didn’t say a word. I simply got up and walked out the door, opened my wings and flew off into the mist.