1 Death Can’t Come

The exact date, time, and place of my death is written on my right arm. I was destined to die before I'd even lived. But who ever said what's written is set in stone? A life is grasped by that life, and he who takes it. And no one will ever grasp mine.

The walls of the cell are grungy, moss blanketing it as night does the world. Dust caking it as icing does a pastry. Cracks line crumbling brick after crumbling brick, a new blemish splitting the corner of an old stone piece. Time has not been kind to this place.

A man sits in the center, chained to the spot. His neck is collared by the aged, deeply rusted iron. Wristlets of deteriorating metal clasp his arms behind his back. The links hold tightly together, creaking as the man breaths.

He's strangling. Choking.

I am dying.

I cannot see the ashen locks dangling around my head. I cannot see the bricks that wither around me. I cannot see the chains that bind me. I cannot see. I am dying.

I've been dying for 5 hours.

"Just...end it…" My voice strained against my tightening throat, blood, a taste i'd grown all too accustomed too, had become void on my tastebuds.

"Stop breathing, stop breathing…" I pleaded with the darkness, but it gave no reply. It was silent. Silent. Silent.

Silent.

"Let...me...die!" As I jerked my neck forward, a snap echoed throughout the dark, like the crunch of a fresh celery stick. The creak of the links went silent. Metal clanged against the concrete, followed by a deaf like state of silence.

It took a few seconds to hear my breathing again.

"This is...the worst." I gagged, coughing up a hot, phlegm-y glob of blood. "Of...of all the...the lies…"

"You believed this one…"

My body jerked up to attention, the dark whispering out to finish my thought. "Who's there…? Why...have you come to me, to kill me?" I called out, scanning the dark corners for life. "Make it quick… make it fucking quick…"

The shadows did no such thing. It only responded, it's voice commanding, yet hushed. "Fool. Have you not realized it yet?" It's words lingered in the musty air before it spoke again.

"You cannot die."

My muscles tightened at the words landing in my ears. "Bullshit…I have to die, idiot!" I snapped, pulling my arm from behind my back, enough to display the marking of my death date.

The darkness did not respond immediately, beyond a gravelly, muffled sigh.

"Fool…" it breathed, a figure moving in the dark, becoming his more pronounced as it moved forward. It continued. "You cannot die. You've been forbidden to taste that common fruit."

Dark, and withered old robes cloaked the figure, almost blending in completely with the shadows behind. The fabric didn't look familiar, nor did it look...tangible, wispy and smoke-like as it flitted about the bars of my holding cell.

"And why's that?" I relaxed against the chains, sitting back on my feet. "I've been marked for death, and you mean to say that's a load of shit?" I leaned further back, sitting normally, and pushing myself to my feet from there. "The fuck are you anyway? Do you even know what you're talkin-"

A chill raced down my spine, the shadows about the cell swirling violently as the figure appeared in front of me. From beneath his dusken cloak, I caught a glimpse of his true features. The crimson glow of his eyes, glaring from the black of the sockets, seemed to grab hold of my soul.

"I know exactly of what I speak. You'd do quite well to listen to me, foolish man." The voice's hushed tone vanished all but entirely, becoming more resonant of a boom. "Know if it were possible, I would've taken your life already. However…"

My voice crawled up my vacant throat, catching for a moment before slipping onto my tongue. "H-...however…?" I breathed, the air about this being more suffocating than my restraints.

Again, it continued, quieting its boom. "However, you have been designated an alternate purpose." It explained.

I couldn't help but raise an inquisitive brow to the notion. "Alternate purpose? What purpose?"

The figure moved again, something at its side lifting up. From beneath its cloak protruded a finger, barely visible as bone white in the dark. "The mark on your arm was never one of your death." It paused.

"It is a mark of your destiny."

I glanced to his finger, before returning my gaze to his assumed face. "What sort of...destiny?" I swallowed, a hard lump forcing its way down my throat.

The being rumbled, a sound almost resembling a human's laugh. "That should be obvious enough, fool."

A click sounded behind me, followed by the clang of metal on hard concrete as the tight feeling against my wrists vanished, leaving a stinging pain. "You shall do as you've always done." The twang of twisting metal pierced my ears, and something hard hit my back. The clamp on my neck had not fallen. "But you'll do so in my stead."

My arms dropped to my sides, and I lifted them, stretching the unused muscle. "In your stead?" I asked, letting one arm drop while the other pulled at the metal on my neck, to no avail. "What's that mean…?"

"In your return to roaming this lush, green world of life, you shall take my mantle of deitous." It spoke, the bone whit finger lifting, cloak falling to reveal not only more fingers, but the entire hand, radius, and ulna they were attached to. A skeletal appendage, before my eyes. The hand rose to the cloth upon the being's head, and pulled back swiftly to reveal it's face.

Or rather, it's lack of one. The room illuminated in a radiant blue light, as the cloak's hood fell back to reveal blue flames, engulfing the aged yellow/off-white of a cracked skull. "In short…"

"You will become Death."