His Name Was Death (Dead Man's Tale Book 1)

by J. Eric Hance

  His Name Was Death

  Book One of Dead Man’s Tale

  J. Eric Hance

  Copyright © 2016 Jeremy Eric Hance

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN: 1522999086

  ISBN-13: 978-1522999089

  To Mark, My Dad

  Blood may be thicker than water, but

  family is thicker than blood

  Special thanks to Julia, William, and my editor, Lauren Sweet. Without your help, this book would have never reached its full potential.

  That means you share the blame.

  Table of Contents

  You Really Can Go Home Again

  The Cadaver’s New Clothes

  It’s the Journey

  Cat’s in the Cradle

  Rules of the Game

  A Reaper by Any Other Name

  Red and Black

  The Commute

  The Reaping

  Night and Day

  Photograph

  Anger and Regret

  The Problem with Promises

  Death of a Salesman

  With a Bang

  A Fresh Perspective

  It Even Makes Julienne Fries

  Reflections

  Close to Home

  Another One Bites the Dust

  A New Plan

  Reunion

  The Good, the Bad, and the Distraction

  Ashes, Ashes

  We All Fall Down

  The Caller

  Into the Trap

  A Thin Blue Line

  You Can’t Win Them All

  The Great Escape

  Cost of Failure

  An Unexpected Friend

  Cat and Mouse

  Turning Tables

  Revelations

  Hunter and Hunted

  The Hand of Fate

  A Sinking Ship

  Keeping Promises

  I

  You Really Can Go Home Again

  It didn’t hurt.

  Not at first, anyway.

  There was only the black void, through which I traveled…alone.

  I felt weightless, almost buoyant, floating up through the darkness. Up, not down—I took that as a good sign.

  I mean, at a time like this, direction really does matter.

  Memories chased each other through every corner of my mind. The highlights of a short life: clipped, disjointed and scattered—a typical Hollywood trailer doing its best to create something awe-inspiring out of the boring, overpriced failure of a movie.

  My thoughts, as I watched, were slow and clouded—unfocused. For some reason, I couldn’t remember how I’d come to be here…or where I’d come from.

  Even my own name eluded me.

  Somehow, none of that seemed to matter. Contentment enveloped me like a warm, comfortable blanket on a cold winter’s morning.

  I was at peace.

  And then, damn it, everything went to shit.

  A giant, invisible hand swatted me from above. One moment, I was floating languidly upward without a care. The next, I tumbled at breakneck speed.

  Straight down.

  Harsh dawn split the darkness with light a hundred times more intense than the sun. After light came sound—a jumbled cacophony of pain and terror, as if all the voices of the world cried out in a single panicked discord.

  Sound was followed immediately by heat: an uncomfortable warmth building quickly into a suffocating inferno.

  And then, suddenly, it did hurt. All thought was driven out by the pain—a sharp and unrelenting agony. It screamed louder than any voice: go back—you do not belong.

  Imagine being torn to shreds in the very heart of the fires from Hell by a screaming horde of furious demons. And you’re the one that pissed them off.

  Now imagine longing for that.

  I have no idea how long my torture lasted. Seconds? Centuries? I know only that it ended abruptly—I came screaming from beyond, still trailing wisps of the fire that had failed to consume me, and crashed down naked onto a cold metal table.

  I lay still for several minutes, unable to gather enough strength to even open my eyes. My entire body felt subtly wrong—stiff and almost alien, like it wasn’t actually mine.

  A wave of nausea washed over me. Every inch of my body began to ache, inside and out. Exhaustion threatened to overwhelm me.

  It was an awkward struggle just to breathe.

  I could hear the faint buzz of fluorescent lights and what sounded like HVAC fans, both underscored by a low, constant hum of machinery.

  Which told me exactly nothing.

  Where the hell am I?

  Gulping down several rough breaths, I forced my eyes open.

  The table I lay on was stainless steel. An ominous tray of surgical instruments stood by my head. Mine was the first of five stations, in a line down the center of the room.

  I struggled to a sitting position, sending fresh waves of agony through my extremities. The far wall was filled with square, stainless steel drawers.

  Body drawers.

  I was naked, on an autopsy table, in a morgue.

  Son of a bitch.

  Move! I screamed inside my head, staring at the surgical instruments now suddenly far too close for comfort. Get up and run!

  My body refused to obey.

  A firm hand grasped my shoulder.

  That was all the motivation I needed.

  I yelled out in shock, recoiling violently from the unexpected contact, and lurched off the table. I managed two whole steps before collapsing, helpless, to my hands and knees.

  A mixture of cold air and panicked apprehension dimpled my naked skin from head to toe.

  A man’s voice said, “Whoa, take it easy, son; don’t rush it. The first time is always the hardest, but it’ll get easier.”

  First time?

  Whatever monumental fuckup had landed me naked in a morgue, I’d make damn sure it didn’t happen more than once.

  Across the room, perhaps thirty feet away, an exit sign shone its bright green beacon mockingly above the door.

  Pulse racing, I began to crawl toward it.

  My right arm buckled painfully, spilling me onto my side.

  That thirty feet might as well have been thirty miles.

  The voice spoke again. “It’s okay; calm down, son. Let me give you a hand.”

  My eyes darted back and forth, searching out the speaker.

  He was about seventy, leaning heavily on a black, silver-topped cane. His long white hair, receding at the temples, was combed straight back. He stood only about 5’7”, but from my place on the floor, he loomed high above me. He watched my discomfort with detached curiosity, his ice-blue eyes piercing right through to my soul.

  I knew him.

  Joshua Black was a coroner for the King County Medical Examiner. And he was an old family friend.

  To be honest, he was my brother Steve’s friend, and Dad’s before that. He’d always creeped me out a little bit—he did play with dead bodies for a living, after all—but I hadn’t ever considered him dangerous.

  Waking up naked in his morgue definitely changed my view of things.

  When I finally spoke, there were two voices: one that sounded right in my head, and a second, new voice which sounded strange to my ears. “What the hell is happening?” I looked around slowly. “Why am I in the damn morgue?”

  The strain of speaking even those few words was monstrous. Pain and fatigue mixed in a dizzying haze. Halos circled every light as I fought to stay conscious. What would happen to me if I passed out now?

  What would he do to me?

  Joshua nodded, leaning casually against the next table. “Not the mos
t comforting place after a crappy return trip, I get that. Convenient as hell, though. The dead come and go here without much notice, so long as the right paperwork gets done. Take a minute, catch your breath, and then we’ll get started.”

  My heart leaped into my throat; that tray of surgical instruments was an uncomfortably short distance from the older man’s hands, and he knew how to use them.

  The dead come and go here without much notice.

  He’d always seemed so normal before—but then, isn’t that always the way: he was a quiet man, kept to himself, never bothered anyone…

  Joshua stood, clearing his throat, and took one step toward me.

  I flinched back, trying—and failing—to scramble across the floor.

  Joshua sighed. “Son, you are the twitchiest damn recruit I’ve ever met.”

  “Recruit?” I shot back, working, without success, to get my feet under me. “Is that what you call it? Did you drug me? Is that why I can’t walk, why I can’t think straight?”

  The older man’s eyes snapped wide. “You don’t have a single damn clue what’s going on, do you? You don’t remember anything.”

  I shook my head. “Nothing.” It was true. I couldn’t remember what had happened, or how I’d gotten here. Even my own life was just jumbled bits and pieces: I knew Joshua’s name, but not my own; I knew what I’d done last year, but not ten minutes ago.

  After a long pause, Joshua shook his head slowly, his brows drawing together in a puzzled frown. “The return trip can scramble the brain sometimes, but you’re a bit more confused than normal.” He gazed down at me. “If I wanted to hurt you, son, you wouldn’t have woken up in the first place. So perhaps, instead of flailing around like a fish, you’d like my help getting off the ground?”

  I hesitated, looking at the door. If he wanted to kill me, I’d be an easy target as I struggled to crawl away. Besides, I did obviously need help, and he was the only live person around.

  I nodded briefly.

  Joshua propped his cane against the table, then came around behind me and slid his hands under both my arms. With a grunt, he wrestled me to my feet. I tried to help, but I’m pretty sure my efforts only hampered our progress.

  After three staggering steps, he unceremoniously dropped my naked ass back onto the autopsy table. It was a herculean effort to stay sitting upright, but I managed.

  Just barely.

  The exertion left both of us breathing heavily.

  Joshua retrieved his cane. “I suppose I’d better start at the beginning. Let me know if anything sounds familiar, so I can skip ahead. We don’t have all night.” He returned to his place at the next table, casually leaning against it.

  “My name is Joshua Black,” he said, as if we’d never met. “I’m First Reaper for the Pacific Northwest Region, and I’m your new boss.”

  Wait…

  I couldn’t possibly have heard that right.

  “First…Reaper?”

  “Yeah.” Joshua nodded. “You know, Grim Reaper—black cloak, scythe, really pale complexion, harvester of wayward souls.”

  I stared. There was creepy, and then there was creepy. If Joshua was a coroner who believed himself the flesh and blood incarnation of an Angel of Death, he was a very dangerous person indeed.

  A person with whom I was trapped in a morgue.

  And I couldn’t even crawl, let alone run.

  “Come on, Joshua,” I tried in my best soothing voice, “you can’t possibly believe you’re the Grim Reaper.”

  The man cocked his head to one side quizzically, considering me. “No, son…”

  I breathed deeply in relief.

  The feeling didn’t last.

  “We—you and I—are both Reapers.”

  My heart lurched briefly before dropping down through the floor. I stared longingly across the room, back to the door, wishing more than anything I had the strength to escape.

  Joshua really was completely around-the-bend insane, and we’d somehow managed to miss it. Just four days ago, he was at my brother Steve’s New Year’s Eve party, acting all normal. Steve, like Dad before him, was a Seattle police detective; that’s how they knew Joshua.

  The old guy had spent most of the party following me around, though, staring. He was very drunk, and I’d written off his strange behavior as only that, but he had hardly left me alone all night.

  In retrospect, it seemed like a warning sign.

  I should have paid more attention.

  “Come on, Joshua,” I said. “Enough is enough. Let’s just call my brother, and—”

  Joshua’s brows furrowed once again, with that puzzled look. “Do we know each other, son?”

  Only since I was about four—hardly any time at all. He’d obviously completely lost it. “Of course we do, Joshua. Don’t you recognize me?”

  The old man’s eyes searched my face, and he slowly shook his head. “Son, right now,” his words were soft, and full of compassion, “you wouldn’t recognize yourself.” He reached above me with one hand, pulling down the examination light.

  It was an oversized, highly polished version of the stainless steel lights dentists use to blind us all. The surface wasn’t quite a perfect mirror, but close enough for a clear reflection of my face.

  Time stopped.

  A thin, handsomely chiseled face stared back at me. Emotion was painted plainly on its features: shock and terror.

  My emotions.

  But not my face.

  I reached up to touch my cheek, not quite believing the evidence of my own eyes. In the reflection, a strange hand jerked up to the face I did not recognize.

  I leaped to my feet, shoving the reflection and Joshua’s hands away from me.

  Time resumed, and then accelerated, racing manically around me. The room began to spin.

  A dream…it has to be a dream.

  I stumbled a step, maybe two, before crashing to the floor once again. The ceiling spun high above. Joshua spoke, but his words were unintelligible—deep, long and drawn out, like a toy with dying batteries.

  I searched my mind desperately for the last thing I remembered before waking into this nightmare. No answers came. Whether from fear, exhaustion, or self-defense, my brain simply clicked off.

  And the world went black.

  II

  The Cadaver’s New Clothes

  The moon, barely a sliver, casts a stark, cold light on the blanket of snow below. It’s only three inches deep, but even that much is rare in Seattle. Moonlight reflects from the surface, shimmering as if from a million tiny diamonds; the night is bright, but still and quiet.

  We are alone.

  I wrap my arms around Michelle and she nuzzles into my chest before looking up. She bites her lower lip; she’s nervous. I’ve only known her four days, just since New Year’s Eve, but I already read her better than anyone else I know.

  She nods, smiling for a moment, as if reading my thoughts in return.

  Michelle takes a deep, halting breath. “Would you like to come up for a minute?” She blurts it out all at once, as if afraid she might lose her courage somewhere in the middle.

  My heart races. “Sure,” I say, smirking with a forced bravado. “But just for a minute. I’ve got plans tonight.”

  She slaps my arm playfully, laughing.

  The snow crunches beneath our feet as we walk, hand in hand. It’s the only sound in the world, not counting the thunderous beating of my heart—but I’m sure no one can hear that but me.

  You know, probably.

  I climb the stairs in a daze, my thoughts a tumultuous jumble. Michelle is amazing: smart and funny, compassionate and loving, and quite possibly the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known. She’s the kind of woman that changes a man’s life.

  We stop before door 3C while she fumbles for keys. The doormat is a stylized owl, in brown and gray wicker. It asks the question, “Who’s there?”

  I cock an eyebrow.

  “Shut up,” she says, smiling. “It was a gift.”
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  The door swings open; the apartment inside is dark. Michelle slips quickly through, leaving me alone to contemplate the black, yawning maw of destiny.

  One part of me is giddy schoolboy eager to rush forward, while the other is cautious, anxiously hanging back. My heart struggles to play mediator, beating wildly between the two.

  The door closes behind me—almost, it seems, before I make my decision.

  Michelle glances back over her shoulder, face framed by cascades of long black hair. She smiles with a confidence absent only moments before.

  I swallow hard.

  “I’ll be right here,” I say.

  Her smile widens. “Not for long, I hope.” Perhaps it is my imagination, or maybe she is simply more comfortable at home, but her hips sway far more than I previously noticed.

  Maybe she just knows I’m watching.

  Michelle turns away, her rich brown skin vanishing quickly into the dark.

  Harsh light spills from her bedroom a few seconds later. The bed’s corner is just visible, with a soft pink flowered bedspread; at its side stands a dark cherry nightstand. The light does little to brighten the room where I wait.

  My heart beats like fevered jungle drums; a shiver runs the length of my body and my breath quickens. Michelle Harris is an amazing woman, better than I deserve. I’ve dated off and on, but I haven’t felt this way since Sarah Carlton.

  Sarah…

  If not for Sarah’s accident, I’d have never met Michelle; Sarah and I would likely be married today.

  I shake my head, clearing out the ghosts. Tonight is about the future, not a ten-year-old, tragic past. I’ve known Michelle only a few days, but tonight, I can feel, the story of my life will take a dramatic new turn.

  A sharp sound comes from the bedroom—like the pop of a small balloon.

  I jump. The noise seems out of place, punctuated by the ominous stillness that follows.

  “Michelle?”

  Silence.

  The warmth drains quickly away, replaced by an icy, tingling dread. I take one tentative step down the hall, and then another. “Is everything all right?”

  Panic flares, but I can’t seem to stop now. A few more steps bring her room fully into view.