The Afterlife

Chapter One: The Snake In The Eye

"France/Paris: December 2018"

It was a cold night in Paris with a cold breeze sending chills in the air, traffic was scarce, and most people had already gone home from work. Francis Dubois would later wish he had gone home too, but where he went there was no such thing as wish.

Francis Dubois liked his job; he held a small bar near the Montparnasse avenue. Today the bar was empty which was quite unusual but Francis didn't mind too much because the place received quite many clients due to its proximity to the train station station and he couldn't care less about the cemetery which was also quite nearby; He was in his seventies and that meant he was already too old to believe in ghosts even though his wife Francine believed in just about every myth she heard about. One day she had asked him what he would do if someone or something from the myths showed up in his bar. "I have a beautiful wife, take her and spare my life", he had answered jokingly, now he wished one of those things would really come and take him away since he simply couldn't bear her anymore.

He was just thinking about that when the doors of the bar opened and two people stepped inside. Judging by their size, they were quite young, no more than eighteen, but he couldn't make out anything else because they were wearing long black coats with hoods covering most of their faces. One of them had strands of long black hair sprouting from the hood suggesting that she was a girl. Below the black coat, she wore a black 'hello kitty' t-shirt, black skinny jeans and black sport shoes. The boy with her also wore a black t-shirt, black skinny jeans and black sneakers.

The two of them walked slowly across the bar and took seats on the tall stools on the counter just in front of Francis the barman. The boy lifted his head and Francis could finally see his face. He was very young, with dark brown eyes which were almost red, a small pointy nose and a wide grinning mouth with clean white teeth which almost looked inhuman.

"Welcome to 'LE COIN DE MONTPARNASSE', what can I serve you?", Francis asked with courtesy

"Something strong and alcoholic.", the boy said in an accent which was definitely not french.

Francis was going to object when the girl punched the boy hard on the arm and faced him with a sweet smile "Sorry, he's just kidding, we are not yet of age so water will be enough for us", she said in an accent which was just as bad as the boy's and proceeded to grounding the boy who seemed to not like being deemed too young.

As soon as he had set eyes on the girl Francis had understood one thing; the boy and the girl were siblings. He could even go as far as say that they were twins; same brown eyes, same hard expressions of confidence mixed with a little pain maybe. Francis could see that easily, he had a lot of years of experience in examining people's faces since the bar was frequented by many different types of people from thugs to state leaders. He almost felt sorry for the twins .He poured each of them a glass of water and watched them carefully as they chatted calmly seeming as if something was bothering them.

He was thinking about the strange pair when another man entered in the bar. He was probably the tallest, largest and definitely the ugliest man Francis had ever seen and that meant a lot. The man had long blond hair tied in a ponytail behind his back and he was looking around the bar with blue eyes which seemed to pierce right through anything. He was wearing an aviator jacket, camo pants and clean black boots which made him look like someone straight out of a guerilla. What bothered Francis the most were the numerous scars which completely destroyed what could have been a handsome face.

The man was totally scary and he looked downright dangerous. He moved towards the counter in a slow confident stride, a wicked grin clearly drawn on his face. Francis noted the fact that the twins' expressions had also changed; their faces were pale and the boy's grin had disappeared leaving a serious expression which could even be described as murderous. They probably knew the man and it was definitely not on good terms. In any case Francis didn't care, if they had something with the scary man it was their problem, he wasn't going to risk being on the bad side of that one.

"Welcome to 'LE COIN DE MONTPARNASSE', what can I serve you?", Francis asked this time with a forced smile. He had decided silently that he didn't like this man.

"Kids of today are really troublesome ain't they", the man said speaking french with a clear English accent ignoring the barman's question. He faced Francis and waited for an answer. That is when Francis noticed the tattoo in the man's left eye, it looked like a curled snake biting its own tail. He was sure he had seen that thing somewhere else but he didn't remember where.

"You should probably leave this place.", the girl twin said in a low calm but serious tone that sent chills in Francis' spine. "There is no way I can leave my bar, and who are you anyway?", Francis shouted trying to hide the fear which had been creeping inside him for a moment now. "...I will call the poli..."

Francis never finished his sentence as a huge four feet long battle double axe had appeared in the big man's hands and sliced his head off in a swift movement. His head hit the floor first, then his decapitated body followed forming a pool of blood on the once clean floor.

"I don't like people ignoring me..." The big man said then faced the twins who had not moved an inch from where they had been sitting. "Now come with me, the underworld is awaiting your arrival, or else you want me to send you the hard way."

"Sigurd Snake-In-The-Eye, son of Ragnar Lothbrock, you never change, I'm sorry but I'll have to say I  really didn't miss you a bit." The boy twin said with his regained hysterical grin. His sister finished the last drops of water in her glass then faced the big man with her face still serious "I've always found that ouroboros in your eye very repulsive..." she said. "...see, I really don't like you, so why don't we leave it here before it gets even worse." Now the girl had the same hysterical grin as her brothers. "...for you of course."

Sigurd placed his big axe on his shoulder and faced the twins once again. He knew their fate was sealed and they knew it too, but they seemed determined not to make his job any easier. "Well, I guess it can't be helped can it?"

With blinding speed, Sigurd swung his axe and sliced the air at the exact spot where the twins had been sitting only a millisecond before. The brother had jumped to the right and the sister to the left, their capes flying due to the air resistance. Sigurd knew they were trying to get him from the flanks, and with only one weapon it would be difficult to deal with both of them. But it was nothing a Viking like Sigurd couldn't easily take care of.

"It was a great mistake to anger the underworld king you know." Sigurd said as he watched short black swords appear in both twins' hands, "...Escaping was one thing but then stealing those relics, I almost felt respect for you."

"Well the underworld king doesn't seem to mind about us that much..." the boy twin said as he watched his sister take position on the left of the big man "...we've been away for more than four hundred years and he only sends us goons like yourself. when we send you to meet him again, tell him we feel a little insulted by his actions."

"Send some deep regards from me as well...", the girl twin said with a smile which seemed almost maniac, "...tell him that our dinner four hundred years ago was quite..." she made a small kissing gesture.

On those words both twins attacked at the same time and it was the end for 'LE COIN DE MONTPARNASSE'.