1 Contract

In the deepest darkest depths devoid of life, a single piercing cry rang forth like the roar of some great beast from the abyss. It was the sound of sharp nails raking across a chalkboard, an adult fist smacking the face of an abused child, the heart-rending wails of a widow at her husband's funeral. Every awful sound ever heard could be found in that one dreadful cry.

Yet when this horror of a note had ended, the crisis did not pass for a fell voice quickly followed with words that cut deep into all who heard it, "The Lord of Death has fallen. The Lord of Death is dead."

And somewhere, in what could relatively be called a brighter slice of that abyss, the sound of tinkling laughter rang out.

"My turn," a girl whispered.

---

"Leonardo Dante," the announcer said in a deep voice that would have felt at home in a nineties movie trailer. "Genius developer and global gaming icon..."

The lights dimmed to give way to the screens on stage which began to feature a photo presentation of a dark-haired man with olive skin, starting from his days as a blue-eyed, pimple-faced youth to the hoodie-wearing twenty-five-year-old on the cover of Time Magazine.

"At the ripe young age of fifteen, the orphan boy from California quickly stole the spotlight of the gaming industry with inspired ideas that gave form to what many now call the modern virtual reality experience," the announcer continued. "Arriving at the doors of MIT with nothing more than his 2nd-hand laptop and a pair of VR goggles in hand, young Leo quickly impressed his peers with the invention of a lifetime, the world's first truly immersive virtual reality game, Magic and Myth."

The crowd started clapping at the mention of the role-playing game that ten years ago changed the lives of anyone who owned a VR console, allowing millions to finally break free from the mundaneness of everyday life to go conquer dungeons and slay dragons with their friends.

"At age sixteen, Leo created the Portal, the groundbreaking VR tool that simulated near-complete sensory immersion," the announcer explained. "At age eighteen, Leo quit MIT to create Gargantuan Games, currently the leading videogame development company in the world."

More scattered clapping ensued.

"And now, ten years after he set forth on this amazing journey, this titan of industry is being honored with the Iwatani Award," the announcer added as he built up to the finale of his introduction. "Ladies and gentlemen, please give a warm welcome to Leonardo Dante!"

The spotlights flooded the stage, each and every one of them pointing to the right side curtain. But seconds passed into minutes, and minutes passed into that thirty-minute mark where the audience finally realized that Leonardo Dante had just flaked on his own awards ceremony.

In fact, Leo wasn't even in the same Las Vegas hotel where the ceremony was being held. No, at this exact moment in time, Leo Dante was running for his life along a dark alleyway four blocks away from the festivities.

As he navigated his way through the narrow passage, panic kept him from noticing the obvious and his loafers skidded across a wet puddle, sending him crashing into the wall at the far end of the alleyway.

Pain flared into Leo's shoulder as it collided with the cement.

"Sh*t," he gasped through gritted teeth. "It's just my luck… I win the award they named after the guy who made Pacman on the night I'm supposed to die…"

Leo glanced over to the other end of the alleyway. A figure in a tattered cloak was blocking its entrance like a dark silhouette set against the bright lights of the Las Vegas strip behind it.

"Well, sh*t…" he said, leaning on the back wall for support. "I'm not ready to die… not while my dream remains unfinished."

In his rush to escape his pursuer, Leo hadn't realized he'd run into an alleyway with a dead end. Not until it was too late. Yet his desire for life wouldn't allow him to just give up without a fight.

Leo saw the broken pipe at his feet and picked it up. He raised the pipe forward with shaking hands and pointed it at the thing stalking toward him.

It was a tall hooded figure whose cloak billowed behind it as if a breeze were constantly passing underneath.

Despite the pain in his shoulder, Leo pushed himself off the wall. In his mind, he thought about it, the last desperate stand in some unremarkable alley where no one would find him until it was too late.

"I sold my soul to you ten years ago to give me time," Leo whispered. "But ten years was too short to realize my dream, you son of a b***h!"

The hooded figure did not care to respond to Leo's provocations. Silently, it glided toward him like a predator chasing down its prey, and with each inch forward the figure brought with it a cold that seeped into the surrounding air.

Leo could feel the biting cold graze the flesh of his hands, and he remembered that this was what he'd felt ten years ago when the shadow of death first approached him.

He shivered. "Damn… you're that eager to reap my soul, huh?"

The hooded figure was twenty feet away.

It was so cold now that Leo could see the foggy air he'd just exhaled.

The hooded figure was a mere ten feet away.

Leo's hands shook uncontrollably, forcing him to drop the pipe. Fear was slowly creeping in on him, and once more he was reminded of his weak self, the boy at the edge of life grasping for a chance to live.

The hooded figure was five feet away.

Leo stared into the depths of its hood but could see nothing beyond the blackness.

But just as the hooded figure reached out a pale emaciated hand toward Leo, the sound of tinkling laughter rang out.

Suddenly, the hooded figure was violently swept away to the side, its form crashing onto the alleyway's sidewall.

"What the—"

Leo was too surprised by the sight that greeted him to finish his sentence.

There, standing before him, was a teenage girl with chin-length platinum blonde hair and a face as pale as, well, death.

"You're not my long lost kid or something, right?" Leo asked warily.

This type of scam had been tried on him before. But as he looked closer at the girl in her stylish blue coat, he realized he couldn't have been her dad as she must be fifteen or sixteen and nowhere near the appropriate age to be his.

"No, I'm not, you dolt," she frowned.

The hooded figure launched itself off the wall. Its arms flailed wildly toward Leo.

However, the girl simply slapped its hand away from grasping Leo's arm. Then she grabbed onto Leo and unceremoniously tossed him out of the way with a strength no teenage girl had a right to have. Then, while Leo lay sprawled on the dirty floor, the girl turned her soft-glowing violet eyes on the hooded figure.

"This one belongs to me." She smiled at it in a perky way before her face turned dark and menacing. "Now scram!"

The girl raised her right hand, and after a puff of white smoke, a polished obsidian baseball bat appeared where there was none before.

In protest, the hooded figure howled an inhuman howl that was snuffed out rather quickly after the girl took her bat and smashed it onto the side of the hooded figure's hood.

A single strike was all it took for the thing to shatter into a thousand tiny pieces of glass that coalesced together on the floor to form a glowing marble the color of turquoise.

The girl picked up this marble and pocketed it with a smile.

She then turned her face on Leo who had just gotten back on his feet. They each took a few seconds to scrutinize each other.

Leo thought the girl was very beautiful in that perky teenage girl kind of way. She was about his height, so around five-nine, maybe an inch shorter. Her chin-length hair was parted neatly to one side and held in place by a black hairband. Her face was very pale and angular. Dark, bushy eyebrows rose over bright violet eyes. She had a long, straight nose that complimented thin red lips. Lips that were now moving to speak words Leo could barely hear.

A horrible realization struck him then, and this thought sent a deep chill rising up his spine.

"Did you just kill Death?" Leo asked disbelievingly, interrupting whatever it was the girl was saying. He waved a hand at her attire, a red blouse and plaid skirt underneath her blue coat. "Did the girl in the preppy getup just smash Death into pieces with a bat?"

The girl's eyes narrowed slightly, but she'd kept the smile on her face.

"That thing wasn't him… although the Lord of Death is really dead," she answered. "No, I'm his… soon-to-be replacement."

Leo laughed. How else could he respond to such a crazy-sounding declaration?

"Even the Reaper gets reaped, huh," he noted.

"All things end," the girl answered as she walked over to stand before him. "Providing a chance for new beginnings… which is why I'm here."

"What do you mean?" he asked cautiously.

A spark of hope jumped into Leo's chest. After years of failing to find a way out of his contract and raging against the inevitable end of his borrowed time, perhaps a solution had finally arrived.

"Well, Leonardo, I'm here to give you a choice." The girl leaned in toward him. "The Lord of Death never named a successor… and the denizens of the Abyss are currently in an uproar, each and every one of them vying for the biggest slice of pie."

"Ah, and you're one of those opportunists, aren't you?" Leo guessed. "You want to be head honcho, queen of the hill, the lady of the damned."

"You are smarter than you look." She beamed at him before turning around to pace along the alleyway. "Yes, I do recognize an opportunity here, one that could prove beneficial to both of us."

Leo limped over to the wall and leaned his back against it while feigning indifference. But inside him, hope was growing, something he couldn't show her less she took advantage of him somehow. "Go on, I'm listening."

"I want to sit on Death's seat," she said, turning to face him. "You want to escape the death promised you ten years ago. You help me. I help you."

Leo's face was sweating slightly out of nerves. He couldn't help it. This was exactly the thing he was hoping for.

"How will you help me?" he asked.

The girl raised her left hand, and with a poof of white smoke, a scroll appeared. A simple twist of her wrist caused the scroll to unfurl itself, revealing a very detailed contract with absolutely zero loopholes signed in the dried blood of a fifteen-year-old Leonardo Dante.

Leo stared at his contract while his throat went dry, forcing him to gulp visibly.

"As one of the lord's reapers, part of my responsibility is managing soul contracts… and unfortunately, this one can't be voided," she nudged her head toward the scroll in her hand. "You're going to die tonight, Leonardo… However, if you help me get what I want, then your death might just become a temporary situation."

Another puff of smoke and the contract vanished. Yet Leo's eyes stayed glued to the spot where it was only a second ago.

"You'll give me back my life?" he asked, unable to keep the desire from his voice.

"A long and full life, just like you wanted," she answered.

Leo's brow furrowed. "What do you want in return?"

The girl walked over to him and raised his chin with pale fingers — and her touch was as cold as the hooded figure's presence.

"You pollute the minds of people with your… games, yes?" she asked. "Turning them into mindless zombies enslaved to a world that you built."

"That's a harsh way of viewing it," Leo protested. "I build interactive experiences that help people find enjoyment while they escape from their mundane realities."

The girl raised an eyebrow at him. "These people, the so-called gamers… I understand they have very poor life skills that make them less than productive members of your society."

That was another harsh view of the gaming community, Leo thought. Not everyone was a NEET. In fact, there were many highly productive people who chose gaming as an outlet for stress relief. It was a fact Leo gladly pointed out.

"Still, we can assume that there are quite a few gamers your world won't miss, yes?" she pressed.

"Maybe…" Leo frowned. He didn't like where this conversation was headed.

The girl let go of his chin and crossed her arms over her above the average chest.

"I would like your help in driving these wayward souls into signing away their lives to me," she said.

If Leo was a cartoon character, his eyes would have popped out of their sockets after what he'd just heard.

"You want my help in fooling gamers to sign a contract that gives you their souls?" Leo confirmed while feeling unsettled by the girl's proposition.

She nodded. "If it helps you sleep at night, I promise to take good care of them."

She made a sign over her chest that suggested she was crossing her heart.

"What'll you do with them?" Leo asked.

Leo couldn't believe he was actually considering it. He was a selfish and indulgent bastard but he never thought he was Lord-Voldemort-level evil. However, this was a second chance at life, so how could he pass it up?

"Not just me, silly," the girl smiled. "I need your help for the next part too."

"My help?" Leo asked confused.

"You can build the prison," she answered.

"I don't build prisons." Leo crossed his arms as well. "I build inter—"

"—Interactive experiences. Yes-yes," the girl said dismissively. "Well, I'll need you to build one that will allow me to keep my new souls without bringing them completely into the Abyss. Otherwise, I would have to give them away to a higher-ranked reaper."

It was Leo's turn to pace, and the seconds ticked by while he considered it.

He could do it, he knew. It would be easy to disguise a reaper's contract as some kind of non-disclosure agreement for signing up to a new game he'd develop to serve as a prison for the gamers' souls.

"This game… how would we build it?" Leo asked.

The girl raised her right hand again so Leo could see her obsidian baseball bat.

"I can make most things happen as long as I have the equivalent soul energy to create them," she explained.

Leo stopped pacing and glanced sideways at the girl. "What's soul energy?"

"In the simplest terms, it's the stuff all power comes from," she said.

"So… if you had enough soul energy, you could actually build an entire game system based on my ideas," Leo reasoned.

"I could manage something like that. Only, I would need your help with the details… I don't have the kind of imagination you have," she said, flattering a man who obviously had a large ego.

The possibilities streaked across Leo's mind. Finally, he had the means to create a fully interactive and immersive virtual experience—the perfect game, the very dream he'd sold his soul for in the first place.

His spine-tingling chills were back, but they were of a more positive vibe now.

Then Leo thought of another idea, "We don't need to kill the gamers whose souls you claim, do we?"

The girl shook her head. "It actually works better for me if they're still anchored to the mortal plane. That way, no one will sense the arrival of new souls in the Abyss."

That was exactly the answer he was looking for. It meant he wasn't completely evil if he did agree to the girl's proposition.

"Can we use my VR tool to keep gamers anchored?" Leo wondered.

"I suppose so," she answered. "I can turn it into a portal for their souls."

Ironic, Leo thought, as his latest VR console was in fact called the Portal II.

Leo swallowed. He knew his next words would change everything. "So, you'll still kill me, but if I help you then you'll resurrect me?"

"After I claim Death's seat," she said, draping her bat over her right shoulder. The girl offered her left hand to Leo. "Well, Leonardo Dante, what will it be — eternal damnation or a chance at developing the ultimate game?"

Leo took her hand and shook it. "Call me Leo, partner."

"I'm Morgana. Glad to be working with you, Leo," she said.

Morgana grinned in a way that was almost evil. Then, without warning, she swung her bat forward and slammed it onto the side of Leo's face.