With a flick of a wrist and nary a word, Oman escaped my life just as quickly as he had arrived. At least he was kind enough to drop me back outside my door as he bowed gracefully out of my realm.
‘So Doug’, I said to myself as I opened the door into my office. (Funny how I already thought of it as ‘my’ office.) Time to review what we know. Don’t judge me, I like my internal running monologue. It is what keeps me grounded. Let’s approach this with the Sherlock Holmes method. What are the facts?
First, I am dead. But not a big deal, seems there is more to life than your first life. I can deal with that. Step at a time. My Death Transition Consultant, Chuck, is trying to help where and when he can. But he seems to be at a loss with my situation as much I am.
Second, reality is spread between two extremes, the Authority, which I assume is THE God. With a capital G, underline, bold. And the other is the Angelus, which I assume is the fallen angels from the creation myths. The two are in a struggle to control the balance of reality, called the Verse, with the fulcrum being the world that we all are born into, called Prime. They vie for the only place that new souls are brought into existence. At this point, I think I have briefly encountered God’s presence while with Chuck, and I think I met one of the Angelus, Oman. Oman definitely wasn’t like Chuck or any other souls that I have encountered so far. Including my late absent mentor, Anthony. Which brings me to…
Third, my would-be-mentor, a pious and analytical saint of sorts, blows his head off not even five minutes after my stumbling entrance into his realm. A man that would never kill himself found a reason to do just that. His aspect, a way to partition of your mind into other objects, continues to live for a short while in my copy of the map. Which at this point, I am thinking is pretty much a Hitchhiker’s Guide for the Afterlife. He has tasked me to figure out the last few days of his life before he evaporates into the ether.
Fourth, there are three open cases, two of which concerned the aspect of Tony, because he didn’t know about them. Under his blotter, there was a strange piece of paper, and the best clue as to what happened in the intervening days to drive a saint to self-eradicate.
And lastly, a fallen angel Oman has hired me to figure out why a long dead half breed daughter is alive and well on Prime. And I have nothing more to go on than his hunch. Which is worth about nothing at this point. Although, surprisingly, I did find out that I can travel to Prime, assuming the rest of the Verse, as soon as I learn how.
What are my options?
And that leaves me… Sitting on the edge of my desk, drinking a dixie cup of water from the dated water machine sitting next to my inherited couch, not knowing what the fuck to do. I can’t travel like Chuck and Oman (yet), and the aspect of Anthony is sitting on my desk, probably impatiently waiting to be caught up on the cases. I am stuck here, being a research assistant for a grumpy ghost.
I can try calling Chuck. But he said he would be back tomorrow. Is it tomorrow yet? How does one track time in the Verse? I looked out the windows framing one corner of my office, and the mountains looked the same as they did when I first arrived. Snow capped, majestic, and kind of fake.
I can explore my realm, although that just appears to be an office, an apartment, and a bunch of questions that need answers.
I can eat, sleep, and shower, and dress up in some other dude’s clothes.
What are my assets?
I have clothes, shelter, food, and water. I need exactly none of those. I have case files. I have a gun. I have a bunch of things that don’t belong to me. I have the map. I have an implied ability to do things, but I have no idea how to do them.
What are my liabilities?
I lack information. Lots of information. I could ask questions for days. Months. Maybe years. And as I have told myself about 10 times in the last 10 minutes of this internal monologue, I CAN’T DO SHIT.
I sighed, and set my dixie cup on the desk blotter next to the two case files. My finger brushed the edge of the map, and I felt an urgent pressing of something that sounded like ‘what’ from Tony before I pulled my finger away. Let him stew. I needed to think. I walked to the windows and lamented on the view. I miss the city. I miss the noise of traffic. I miss weather.
I closed my eyes and tried to remember what it sounded like from my apartment. The bustle of the noise on the street below, the honking of horns of the highway a mile in the distance, the trundling sound of the delivery trucks dropping off produce at the farmer market down on the corner. I tried to remember the humidity of the night, the fog of the morning, and the crickets singing their songs.
Then I heard them. The crickets came in first, then with a pop, the other sounds flooded in behind it. The trucks, the people, the cars, the horns, the unsatisfied noise of humans going to and fro, striving against the trivial nature of existing, yet defining themselves as something more in the process.
Like a glorified stagehand skipping from show to show, job to job, barely making rent… and dying, brutally. To find himself an investigator of sorts, way out of his depth.
I sighed again, and opened my eyes. The windows were gone. At least the windows looking at the mountains. These windows were different, sliding windows, looking at a fire escape. One was open, with a lonely plant sitting on the sill, the noise of people below filtering up. I poked my head out the window, and saw actual real people moving about down below. I could see cars parked on the street, and young couples walking hand in hand, while older folks sat on their stoops talking about the weather or their hemorrhoids or their ungrateful kids living up in San Fran.
It was perfect. Not quite home, but close enough. I looked up and saw night sky, a filtered haze with a few glimmers of light of far off stars trying to shine through.
It felt like Prime. What was real? Was Prime real? Was any shadow of Prime any less real than Prime itself? Jeez, the questions just could spin philosophical far too quick. I shrugged and let it go. The real question was… did I just relocate the office? Or is that a memory out there? I would have to ask Tony, or Chuck, or something.
I thought about Chuck. Wandering about Prime, sight unseen, picking up new souls as they came to their unfortunate end, moving them to the career fair, trying to help them adjust to the new reality they found themselves in. Then I heard his voice.
“Hey, Doug. What’s going on?”
“Oh hey, Chuck. Sorry, did I just call you?” I said guiltly.
“You did. Nice job. I take it was an accident?” I could hear his grin.
“Yeah, sorry. Since I have you on the line, how do I tell time in this joint?”
“Anthony must have messed with his realm. Usually you just look up. Sun and moon and all that. Watches still work, the solar system still spins, and time marches on!”
“I think I did something to my realm already. The mountains are gone, and I am in a city of some sort, feels like home.” I admitted.
“Nice one, Doug. You are picking things up quick, aren’t you?”
“Am I home?” I asked meekly.
“Probably not, but everything fits in the Verse. You are probably damn close. I will stop by tomorrow at 9am, ok?”
“Ok.”
“Later Doug.”
“Later.” But he was already gone.
…Screw it, I am going to bed.