The Key In The Fireplace

Part 6: Marcela And The Devil

Within this story you're to learn one thing right from the beginning. Death is not the end. Not here. Death is meerly the finally of a three part saga. Birth, Life, Death. How it has always been and will always be. Birth is the same for all who enter. Life is where choices are made. And death is where you are finally put to trial for every crime you've ever committed.

In the case of Marcela Sweet, unfortunately, Death was not very co-operative the day she passed.

Waking up in a dark, damp, bricked room.  Marcela was alone. Which was a new take on her world previously inhabited by people dying to be at her side. She began to call out as one would expect.

"Hello? Is anybody there?!" She called.

A voice dark and grim but also uncomfortably welcoming whispered back to her. "Such a scared lost child. They always are. What are you afraid of child?"

Marcela responded. Where am I? What happened to me?"

The voice began to explain. "Well child. If you're here speaking to me. Then I'm afraid to inform you but you're no longer among the land of the living."

Marcela choked. "You don't mean to tell me I've passed?!" She thought for a moment back to how she used to spend her Sunday mornings wrapped in fancy dress then responded thus. "Does that make you... God?"

The voice let out a humming chuckle. "Not Quite"

Marcela broke. "But if you're... I assure you i never sinned! Well... Nothing I hadn't confessed!"

The voice stopped Marcela to reassure her (the best he could do with such a sinister infliction in his voice). "Dear child. Sweet, sweet child. You need not worry of the sins from up there. For those are the past and I shall pardon you from them... If... You take under my cold wing for guidance."

"If that's what it takes" Marcela inhaled. "Then yes. I will take your guidance and do your bidding."

The voice had suddenly grown a face in the form of a white grin in the dark room. "Come to me my child." Marcela began to walk towards the looming creature as it continued. "Come to me and you shall feel my embrace. As you take on your new role this afterlife as prepared you for. At long last you've arrived for me. Sweet and savory. And with such great timing I might add. I was just starting to get hungry."

Before Marcela had a chance to react **CRUNCH**

Birth. Life. Death. A trilogy. Nothing more.