I Am Death (completed)

Chapter 7: You Drive

Sebastian and I started spending more time together, I missed laughing and somehow he manages to get it out of me. People have stopped crying over the memorial in front of Liz's locker and the janitor has swept the dead flowers away, it'll be someone else's locker soon.

As Sebastian and I walk into the next hallway I'm made to stop dead in my tracks, he follows my glare to someone who's just walked into the same hallway as us from the opposite end. Everyone notices my glare now and turns to look at the grief stricken boy at the other end of the corridor, clutching his books for dear life. He was the driver, and he has no right to feel grief.

I lean over to Sebastian "what the hell is he doing back here?!"

"I heard he's waiting until he has to appear in court, I don't know why they let him come back to school" how could they do it?! How could they let that murderer walk these halls? What possessed them?! I should kill him, I should kill him and drag his sorry excuse for a soul into Limbo, I'll unleash the forces of hell unto him and keep him there until he fades away. However, the most I can do in front of all these people is punch him.

I get ready, I feel my feet start to stalk towards him, fire in my eyes as I ball up my fist. A hand grabs my arm and tugs me back, I watch as the boy's eyes sting with tears and then turns around and leaves "YOU COWARD!" I scream, unable to contain my rage, everyone's staring at me now as Sebastian holds me back from tearing that coward apart.

I shake him off and walk in the opposite direction towards the ladies room, I can't even think right now, I feel a darkness hover over my soul and I fear for myself. Angels of Death, or Reapers, whatever you want to call us, we're supposed to be neutral, we aren't good and we aren't evil, but I feel myself wanting to become the kind of Reaper that these people fear.

The temptation is too great for me to control so I let myself slip out of the physical world and into what I call the ghost dimension, when I first walked among the living as a child after dying, they couldn't hear me, see me or feel me, that's the ghost dimension. I walk through the door and see Sebastian, like he's standing guard. I want to make sure he's no where near that boy so he doesn't see what I'm about to do.

Now that I know where Sebastian is, I close my eyes and concentrate on the boy, when I open them I'm in the parking lot, he's walking through it to leave, for a moment there I thought they'd let him continue to drive. When I'm sure we're alone I take my physical form in front of him, scaring him when I suddenly appear "you scared me" he chokes out, I SCARED HIM?! I... SCARED HIM?! "I'm sorry okay, I shouldn't have..." I grab his throat and throw him down on the floor.

"No shit asshole!" I should kill him, it would be so easy "she had a life, she was meant to have a family and grow old but you took that from her!" All I'd have to do is ghost my hand, pass through his chest and wrap my physical hand around his heart, then I could squeeze it until it gives up.

He coughs and holds up his hands in defeat "I know! I know I'm sorry..."

"Don't apologise to me! Apologise to Lizzie when you see her!" I lift my arm, I'm ready to reach into his chest and stop his heart, but someone stops me again, the boy is gone and so is the parking lot, someone's pulled me into Limbo "daddy..." I'm screwed.

His eyes burn into my soul as he crosses his arms and stares down at me "what were you doing?!" He sounds angry... very angry... in fact I don't think I've ever heard him so angry before.

"I..."

"You almost upset the balance! A Reaper does not take lives, Raven, we guide those that fate has already taken! Killing that boy would have had repercussions that you cannot even imagine, your soul would be torn apart and thrown into eternal suffering, a fate much worse than what the mortals call Hell!" He grabs my shoulders and shakes me a little, as if to try and shake some sense into me "do you understand, Raven?!"

Luckily I can cry here, I feel a sense of relief when tears roll down my cheeks, but also a great sense of shame, I nod quickly as I take in a sharp breath "yes father I'm so sorry! I don't know what came over me I was just so... angry! Please understand why..."

"Of course I understand! But you must never cross that line, we are neutral beings, and we protect the natural order by helping souls move on. Come here" oh no, not the book! I've learned my lesson just don't make me look at it again! "This is the book of the dead"

"I know father" like I haven't seen it a hundred times.

He opens it to today's page "look, that boy is not on the list, you see? He was not meant to die today, if you had killed him, a servant of fate who does not interfere with the natural order, then everything would fall off balance..." and the world would go kablooie, I know, I know "... and there would be no telling how long it would take to fix it" he flips back to the day when Liz died "there is your friend, it was written, Raven"

"Try looking at tomorrow, maybe the drivers name is there" one can only hope.

He shakes his head and closes the book "no, we never look forward" god! I hate all of this! All the damn rules! There are so many! Don't do this, don't do that, I mean... is there no end?! I am Death, that's pretty big, and I'm not even allowed to read the last page of the story?!

As he walks away I think about the technical side of the book "but there's a last page, does that mean Earth will be destroyed one day?" Well wouldn't that be one heavy work day?

"No, it means we would need a new book" he points to the thick book, it's as thick as my head, and as long as my forearm "that is only this years book" my god, it's so... big! "Now, I believe you are late for class, and when you get home, we shall talk more about what you almost did" oh joy.

When I reach class and listen to the teacher tell me I'm late again, I can already feel a mood loom over me, like a dark cloud. I haven't seen it in a while but when I sit down I can feel Sebastian staring at me, I turn to the desk next to mine and glare at him, to which he slowly looks away.

Eventually the class ends and as we're walking out Sebastian pulls me aside to talk, I'm so not in the mood for this right now! "Where did you go?"

Oh right... I sort of slipped into the ghost dimension didn't I? "What do you mean?" Well that was dumb, I couldn't have said anything less dumb?

"I mean, I went in the ladies room to make sure you were okay, and you were gone, into thin air"

How do I explain this away? There aren't any windows in the ladies that I could have slipped out of, I couldn't have passed Sebastian while he waited for me without him seeing me, so there's nothing I can say to convince him that I didn't just disappear "magic" I whisper sarcastically and turn on my heel to walk towards our next class, my sarcastic reply won't last for long, soon he'll be asking questions again, like why I disappear on a daily basis, I'm running out of excuses.