Before love, there was hatred. Before happiness, there was sadness and before life, there was Death. In the world of the living, Death seems unavoidable, the final destination before rest. Some find relief and even morbid curiosity in Death; it's an interesting phenomenon which I do not understand. Why do those who find themselves locked up in the chains of life, petrified and hysterical, smile in the face of Death. I fear that's humanity for you, full of surprises and chaos.
People whisper that Death wears a hooded cloak of midnight black, its bony fingers clutching to a Sickle to which its grim skeletal face reaps the souls of the dearly passed. Humans are simple minded creatures, they rather believe in something fantastical than live in reality even if the truth is staring them in the face.
Death is simply an idea, a thought that has twisted into unbelievable proportions. Death is simply a word created by humans who try to explain things that they do not understand.
Who am I? I am something. Not quite a person yet not quite nothing.
I was there in the beginning of time; I watched the sun rise and set over the Garden of Eden. I took the souls of the first sinners and I watched as their families wept and grieved over corpses. I do not wear a cloak or a robe and I do not carry a sickle to reap. I am created to guide souls and bring them to rest. I do not have a name but many call me "The Grim Reaper" or "The Destroying Angel".
I wander the earth, looking for lost souls to guide them and let them rest either in eternal light or darkness.
Of course, humans can't see us. Their vision is far too dull to even perceive of our existence. Some of the souls are stubborn, hoping and trying so hard to get people to notice them despite my monotonous warnings.
As much as I despise souls with their constant whining and sobbing, I couldn't help but feel sorry for them, leaving their loved ones must be hard. I can't feel emotion but over the past millennium, I've learnt quite a few things about how the human mind works. Love can be lust, sadness can be bitterness and beauty can be pain. I find emotions to be problematic and a chore yet that is one thing I admire about humans, they feel so much pain everyday but they keep pushing even to their breaking point.
I met this certain soul. One so pure and virtuous, an untainted soul in the cruel hard world of humankind. The soul could light up the whole room with her spark yet even the most righteous soul has her secrets. She taught me many things about humanity and how despite flaws, it's worth protecting.
I was in Lawrence, Kansas going through my usual routine around the hospital with all the dying and dead. There was this Swiss psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross that created this model for the five stages of grief. Most of the souls I greeted reacted according to the model, looking at me first in denial as if I was pulling a prank on them that their families were in on.
Then came the rage, the wave of fury that settles onto them as they scream, yell and expel words of every kind, most of which I have not heard of. Once their anger subsided, they would try to bargain with me, getting to their knees and using anything they could think of as a chess piece. I would just stare at them numbly until they just broke down.
Souls couldn't cry but they could still feel ebbs of sadness, the abyss of depression that swallows them as they wept and cried. Endless streams of self-loathing and sympathy for oneself. Eventually, they come to terms with themselves and accept their death in which I have to evaluate if they're able to pass on or stay as a wanderer until they sort their baggage out.
I felt a pinch of sympathy for the parents of a little girl, around the age of 11, that was lying on a hospital bed, it was time for her to go and I think her parents must've sensed that with the wails and howls that could be heard echoing around the cold walls of the dull room.
I gently touched her forehead as I saw her soul stand up separating from her body and sat beside her cold, unmoving body. We sat in silence for a while as I let her observe her surroundings and let the news sink in.
Children took the sentence surprisingly well; they only felt sadness at leaving their parents alone.
"Am I dead?" She said calmly, looking at me with pale blue eyes, one devoid of the panic that I was expecting.
"Yes. I am here to help you decide where you rest." I placed my cold palm against her burning hot forehead as I watched her memories fly by in quick blinks. I measured her false scales alongside her honest scales and it risen up in favor of the honest scales.
"Your soul shines bright child, you may ascend to the stars and rest now." I was ready to shut the eyes of her soul when she stopped me by gripping to my wrist.
"Wait...I-I want to..." She stuttered before shaking her head slightly and nodding at me, closing her eyes tightly as I placed my hand over her eyes yet there was no blinding light or the disappearance of her soul.
"That's never happened before..." I looked at my hand before pressing it harder to her eyes yet nothing happened. I didn't understand what was happening, her soul was pure and there was no trace of baggage.
I removed my hand as her eyes fluttered open and she sighed slightly, looking at her parents with a dull sense of sadness. I was stupefied, this had never happened before in the entire existence of mankind.
"This is impossible..." I stared blankly at her.
"What is?" Her voice was laced with confusion.
"You, you're pure, you should be resting right now yet here you are, standing in front of me. There must be some mistake...do you have some unfinished business?" I paced back and forth in the room, trying to think of a logical reason to why she's not resting.
"I-I...I don't know...I just feel empty."
Empty? That was a symptom of baggage but I don't understand how a pure soul still has baggage, it has never happened before. I just didn't understand but I couldn't dwell on the thought with hundreds more souls waiting to be reaped.
"Well, until you find out what's holding you back, I can't reap you." I said to her and turned to leave when I felt something grip onto my wrist again. It was the girl, looking at me with wide eyes.
"Wait! Mister, please don't leave me alone." She looked absolutely petrified. I didn't like souls tagging around me but she was a definite mystery and curiosity won out my annoyance.
"Alright kid. Follow me and don't cause any trouble. You got that?" She nodded quickly as I walked out of the room now with a new companion tagging behind me.
