Afterworld

by Lynnette Lounsbury

  ‘An hourglass,’ he murmured.

  ‘Exactly.’ Eva was all business. ‘It’s to keep your minutes in. Those two things are the only things nobody can steal from you.’

  ‘Really? Why?’

  She reached for his hourglass and tried to grab it, her hand slipping in the air around it. She shrugged. ‘It’s just the way it is.’

  ‘But why would anyone want to steal it?’

  ‘To get your minutes. They are the most valuable thing in Necropolis. The only thing of any real value. Kind of like money. Only they actually have a function.’

  ‘Necropolis?’ Dominic felt as though he were coming in on a story halfway through.

  She gestured with her hand. ‘This. This is Necropolis. City of the Dead. More accurately, City of the Preparation of the Dead. I’ll explain as we walk. Let’s head to Giraldo’s and get something to eat and drink. You’ll be getting hungry.’

  They walked silently for a few minutes until Dominic’s head started to feel less numb and a rush of questions filled it. Eva seemed to be waiting for them.

  ‘Why do I need to eat if I’m dead?’

  ‘Everything is pretty similar here. We eat, we sleep. We do it for energy and strength the same as in old life. The only real difference is we can’t die. Obviously.’

  ‘So we just live here forever? This is it? Heaven?’ He was hit by a horrible thought. ‘It’s not hell, is it?’

  She laughed and Dominic found himself comforted by the sound. She might have a tough personality, but at least he wasn’t alone and that laugh sounded as though there was someone nice somewhere inside the cloak.

  ‘No. At least not yet. This is only the first level of the Afterworld. You can’t bring anything in, but you can take whatever you can carry out. This is where you prepare for the next.’

  ‘Next what?’

  ‘Part of the Afterworld. The Maze.’ She said it as though he should already understand what she was talking about.

  ‘What about my sister? She was in the accident. If I’m dead, she must be too. Where is she? Shouldn’t we wait?’

  Eva looked at him and he could feel her measuring him, choosing her words.

  ‘Just tell me the truth. Please.’

  She sighed gently. ‘She may have died with you, but she may not come here at all or she may come here at another time – in the future. Or the past.’

  He felt a small panic bite at him and tried to swallow it. ‘Can you,’ he tried to be polite, ‘give me a second to think?’

  She didn’t reply. Instead, she walked a little more quickly. He hoped he hadn’t insulted her, especially if being a Guide was something important, but he needed to think. Maybe if he could look into the lake again, he could see what happened to Kaide.

  He peered around again, trying to get his mind to take in the new place. The streets were not very wide and there weren’t any vehicles or proper roads. Just a footpath width of cobbled black stone, the same hard, matte stone that everything seemed to be made from. He wondered how people lived with so much black stone. Everything was so dark, and as the daylight faded and the light grew even murkier it became impossible to see where the path finished and the houses began. A building to his right suddenly lit up. The building didn’t have windows, but rather the walls were the lights, the stone glowing suddenly from within and expressing a soft grey-blue light that filled the street with a gentle glow. Houses all up the street followed suit and Dom was stunned to notice that each one, while all made of the same black stone, threw its own soft colour; muted orange, brown or even red light. The street was far from the gothic city he had imagined, it seemed more like a subdued theme park.

  They walked through a town square with a beautifully wrought fountain and an odd rendition of a horse prancing above it. The water was not the thick liquid from the lake outside, but regular water, fresh and cold as it sprayed fine mist into the air. There were people sitting in the square talking and eating and Dom noticed immediately that there were no children. The place was clean and simple to the point of being ascetic, but the people seemed happy enough.

  He almost had to run to keep up with Eva, who had picked up her stride even more as they walked through a narrow section of buildings that were more like small high-rises than houses. Everything was an odd mix of ancient and modern. Some of the buildings were small apartment buildings, square and slick, the black stone almost seamless, while others were medieval-style buildings with wooden beams and painted plaster walls. Some were almost gothic with buttresses holding them in place. Even the older ones had the softly lit stone instead of glass windows.

  They had a soft sheen and while he had a feeling whoever was inside could see him perfectly, he couldn’t see in. It wasn’t reflective either. He stared at a muted yellow wall and it was like standing in front of a mirror and seeing only light; soft and empty light.

  Everything was very clean in the City; there was no smell of trash. He supposed nothing could decay when you were already dead. His brain spun for a moment. What happened to leftover food? Did it just vanish? A few people walked past. They glanced at him, then took a second look, but kept walking. One was wearing similar clothes to his own, a T-shirt and a pair of jeans, while the other was in a cape and outfit similar in style to Eva’s. He turned towards her and started to ask her something. ‘Why—’

  She interrupted him. ‘I’m allowed to talk now?’ She sounded a little antagonistic. ‘You want to know about your clothes?’

  He nodded.

  ‘People come here in whatever they die in. Your clothes won’t break down like they do in life, but they might get torn or dirty so you can change into whatever you want. There are plenty of places that sell clothes. Some people die in their underwear. Or nothing at all. They usually want something fresh.’ She grinned wryly. Dom tried to smile a little, but found his face stiff.

  Eva took her cue to keep talking.

  ‘As I was saying, the City is supposed to be a place where you prepare and save time. Time is the currency here. You will be paid for work in minutes.’ She pulled a small silver sphere from her bag and showed it to him. ‘This is one minute.’ She pushed it into the top of her own hourglass and it turned liquid, pooling in the bottom segment. The hourglass seemed to grow a little in size to accommodate it. ‘You can collect as many as you want, but an hourglass will only hold 10,080. That’s one week. That’s the most you can take with you out of the City. Some people try with less, but my advice is to take every second you can fit. You’ll need them.’

  ‘For what?’

  Eva grinned. ‘First, here is Giraldo’s. I don’t recommend this place. It’s a horrible dive for drunkards to waste their minutes, but we may find someone we are looking for in here, so stay close and don’t let anyone know you are new.’

  Dom imagined the dazed expression on his face might alert them to that, but tried to do as he was told. They walked up to a door, which vanished into a puff of mist as they approached and materialised again behind them. Dom almost broke his neck trying to watch it work. From the inside it seemed to be a wrought iron door, though of course it was black stone. He turned and peered into the gloom.

  The place was like an average gloomy dive back in life. Or back on Earth. Dom didn’t know quite how to think of the past yet. He still had a strong feeling he was about to wake up back in the car with Kaide laughing at him. The place didn’t seem to have any light source and yet each table had a faint ring of light around it. Almost enough to see the faces, but not quite. People were eating and drinking and there was plenty of low noise: music, chatter and the occasional drunken laugh. There didn’t seem to be any laws about underage drinking in Necropolis as no one had yet thrown him out. Eva was weaving her way through the tables bending to check under people’s hoods and slowly making her way past the bar – which only stocked one sort of drink, something in opaque ceramic bottles – and into the back corner. There was a man sitting at a table covered in bottles, his head flung back and his mouth op
en, asleep or unconscious.

  Eva walked calmly up to the table, slapped both sides of the man’s face hard and then sat down. She gestured for Dom to sit beside her and he sank onto a bench that, finally, seemed to be made of wood rather than stone. If this was his Guardian and a Guardian had any sort of protective role, Dom knew he was in trouble. The man swung his head forward and held a long curved knife unsteadily at Eva’s chin. His eyes were dark and bloodshot. A face full of angled features. He looked like a medieval knight.

  ‘You again? Why are you here again? He came back? I told you, it’s not our problem. You know better than to interrupt me when I’m busy thinking.’ His thick accent was Spanish, or South American, Dom wasn’t sure. ‘I mean drinking!’ He laughed, but kept the knife at her throat.

  ‘You and I are together again. I don’t know why, some cruel cosmic joke, I imagine. But this isn’t Roberto. This is a new one, Dominic Mathers.’ She pushed the knife away from her throat and watched with disdain as he wobbled back into an upright position and belched loudly.

  ‘Oh for blood’s sake, I haven’t finished drinking off the last one. How do they come so thick and fast?’ He gazed deeply into Dom’s eyes and frowned in surprise. ‘You’re a boy.’ He glanced at Eva who said nothing, but Dom knew he had missed something. The man reached out and grasped Dom’s arm, the heat of his hand warming the skin. He tilted his head as though he were trying to figure something out. ‘You can’t be more than sixteen years old.’

  ‘I’m fifteen.’ Dom tried to hold his gaze, despite the angry, drunken eyes. He had a very handsome face, in an old fashioned kind of way. His moustache and goatee were overgrown with stubble. His hair was black with no trace of grey in it and Dom guessed that he might be forty years old, maybe younger.

  ‘I am your Guardian, boy.’ He sighed. He lifted several bottles trying to find one that wasn’t empty. He succeeded and took a deep swig, emptying the last drops. ‘I don’t want to be, but there doesn’t seem to be any free will left in the bottle does there?’ He laughed and turned the bottle upside down. A drop hit the table. The liquid glowed a gentle red and then evaporated. The man threw it against the wall, watching it shatter and clatter on the floor. A few people turned their heads, but most ignored the noise.

  ‘You going to make an attempt at getting out of here or am I wasting more of my eternal life on you?’ He sounded tired this time. He shook his head like a dog shaking itself of water, and a sudden smile lit his face. The glow of it made him completely different, almost surreal, and Dominic sat back in his seat. The change was so complete he was too surprised to answer.

  ‘I haven’t explained anything much, we were trying to find you.’ Eva made it sound like a reprimand.

  The Guardian raised an eyebrow and winked at Dom. ‘She knows everything, this girl. You just ask her.’

  Dominic couldn’t help but smile and it earned him a dirty glance from his Guide and a slap on the shoulder from the man beside him.

  ‘I apologise of course for my bad behaviour, I occasionally drink too much.’ He looked at Eva. ‘Okay, I often drink too much, but centuries of this job will do that to you. I am Eduardo.’ He rose and executed a flourishing, if somewhat unstable, bow before tumbling back into his seat. It was then that Dom noticed his hair. It was pulled back in a low braid so he had not seen its length before. Eduardo’s hair reached the floor. He swung it back over his shoulder and out of the way as he steadied himself in his seat.

  ‘I’ll summarise.’ He grinned at Dom, leaning forward and gripping his forearm again. His eyes, though slightly dulled by the liquor, were bright and intense. Dom liked him completely, though he wondered how Eduardo would be able to protect him against anything.

  ‘You are dead. This is the Necropolis. You have to earn enough minutes to find your way through the Maze. You will also have to cross the River. You will have your heart weighed against the feather of truth. If you are not devoured, you will meet the Awe and then it will decide your future. If you fail at any of it, you come back here and stay here for all eternity drinking and waiting. And drinking some more.’ He sat back, the grin gone from his face for a moment, a deep sadness etching it with lines.

  Dom was stunned. ‘Sorry. I got just about none of that.’

  Eduardo watched him for a moment and burst into more of his infectious laughter. Dom joined him softly, feeling that laughing might be the only way to avoid bursting into tears. He wanted to go home. So desperately his heart beat faster at the thought. A deep panic coursed through him. He wanted his sister and the horrible smell of India and his mother’s fake smile. He tried to wake himself up, to think himself back to reality. It couldn’t really be like this. This couldn’t be death. Death was heaven or hell or nothing. Nothing would be better than this. This was, this was . . . he caught his breath. This was too much.

  Eduardo saw his face and tightened his grip on Dom’s arm. It was a gentle touch, but it pulled him back to the moment, the smell of the bar, the noise.

  ‘It’s not what any of us want. But it’s where we are. You are here and you must accept it. There is no other choice. This is death.’

  Eva watched impassively. ‘We need to get back to the room soon so let me explain a couple of things. Like I said, the currency here is time. Everything costs minutes and that is what you will earn. I will help you find a job and you can earn enough time to go on to the Maze if you want to. Once you have enough time you have to choose. You move on or you stay and we take on a new death.’

  Eduardo gestured to a barmaid who brought over a plate of steaming stew for Dom. He looked at it wondering if he would ever want to eat again, but then the steam hit his nose and the smell forced a spoon into his hand. He stuffed the thick brown mixture into his mouth and was surprised to find he had no frame of reference for the taste. It was like nothing he had ever tried. It was good, maybe even delicious, he wasn’t sure. He pulled a face, concentrating on the mouthful.

  He saw suddenly that Eva and Eduardo were smiling.

  ‘What?’ he asked. They just smiled. ‘What is this stuff? It’s weird.’

  ‘Not a vegetarian back in life were you?’ Eva asked.

  ‘No. Not at all. I think we were the only beef eaters in India!’ He was confused.

  ‘Animals don’t come to the Afterworld. They go straight back I think. Or straight on. Anyway, there are no animals here. So no meat.’ She shrugged.

  ‘So there are not even dogs or cats or . . .’ he thought about it, ‘mosquitoes?’

  ‘Nothing.’ Eduardo grinned. ‘Get used to that lentil mush, it’s about as good as it gets.’

  Dominic had another wave of horror that this might not be a dream. The food was not bad, but surely not even a dream could be this weird. No animals, no family, no life. He thought he might write a story about this when he regained consciousness in the hospital. That had to be it. He was in a coma after the accident and he would eventually come out of it. Eduardo’s eyes narrowed as he watched the look of relief come over Dom’s face.

  ‘You need to believe this, Dom. People who don’t believe it wander around for decades. There are people who have been here for hundreds of years because they will not accept that life was just the beginning.’

  Dom was more interested in this idea than thinking about truth or belief. ‘You mean there are famous people here? Like . . . Julius Caesar.’

  ‘Do you really think someone like Julius Caesar would still be here?’ Eduardo frowned. ‘He moved on with only a few thousand minutes. He is long gone. Of course – he had no trouble believing he was dead. It’s only the more modern generations who are surprised by it.’ He laughed again. ‘You people who never think about death, who fear it, who do not talk about it. You are the people who wander aimlessly through it the same way you did through life. I never minded being a Guardian until the 1900s.’

  ‘Now that’s a load of shit,’ Eva snapped. ‘You complained about every job you’ve done with me, I think you’ve probably been complaining
since the beginning. We need to get going. Get you a bed and then a job. Can you pay for all this?’ She gestured to the empty pots. Eduardo pulled out an ornate hourglass and tipped a handful of silver minutes from the top. He laid them on the table and they rolled towards the middle where they were immediately sucked into a small hole in the wood. He smiled at her with drunken charm.

  ‘I always pay my debts.’

  ‘Except last time. And the time before. And then, the time before that. All of which I paid for.’ She stood and left in one swift movement and Dom almost upset the bench trying to follow her. Eduardo stumbled to his feet, his cape and hair swinging wildly around. Dom wondered if he would be able to make it out of the building, but he wove his way between tables and everyone seemed wholly unsurprised to have a drunk bumping their elbows and backs. Perhaps it just went with the territory. They exited the door the same way they had entered. It vanished as they approached and reformed behind them.

  The streets were completely lit now and Dom could see the shape of the City. It was so strange. The architecture seemed to have evolved over time, yet the same stone was used in every house. Some glowed with coloured light, some were dark. It would have been beautiful if it wasn’t so completely strange. There was nothing to compare it all to in his mind so he felt a constant sense of being lost and confused. He had always imagined death would be relaxing – eternal sleep or at most a heaven with nothing to do but sit around and be quietly happy about everything. He realised Eduardo was right; he had not given much thought to what happened after death. Just the actual event itself. Nobody on Earth really wanted to die, but what they were talking about was the actual event of dying, not what came afterwards.

  Before he could think any more about it he was pulled and pushed flat against a dark wall in a dark alcove between two narrow buildings. Eva had pulled him from behind, his T-shirt stretching so tight against his neck he could barely breathe, and across his chest was Eduardo’s thick, muscled arm. Eduardo was standing in front of him, the curved knife in hand. Protecting him. From something.