Death Inc.

Technically, Jerry Carroll had been dead for seven days now. That was, dead in every conventional medical sense of the word anyway. It had all come as a bit of a shock to him, as you would imagine. Firstly, he had been somewhat down on his luck anyway, but being killed had really been a downer. Secondly, his death had been a huge mistake and it should have been someone else who’d copped it. He attempted a heavy sigh as he pondered this, but it sounded more like he was blowing a raspberry, as the flap of skin where his throat had been cut vibrated noisily in the escaping rush of air. Typically, he had been in the wrong place at the wrong time and had gotten involved with the wrong people. There was no denying he had been involved with some slightly dodgy dealings but had never intentionally hurt anyone and certainly didn’t deserve this. It should have been one of the other couriers, Al the Snake, who went on this particular delivery. Admittedly his memory was patchy at best; but now it was cracking up like an iceberg drifting further and further into warm waters.

Jerry had always avoided going to Fat Larry’s for work if he could. That mob were into some heavy shit, way out of his league and he knew it. He had only got involved with Fat Larry to pay off some outstanding gambling debts, otherwise he had steered clear of the really bad crowds. The only reason Jerry did this drop, was because Al the Snake had cried off at the last minute and Fat Larry had offered Jerry an extra 25% bonus to replace him. In the end greed and temptation got the better of him and he had said yes. It was the worst, and one of the last, decisions of his life.

What Jerry hadn’t known was that the reason Al the snake had backed out, was because he had been syphoning off some of the merchandise before delivery on his runs. Some went straight up his nose, the rest he sold on for a tidy profit. One of Larry’s main buyers was Theodore. No-one knew his full name, and heaven forbid if you called him Theo. “Only my mama calls me Theo,” he had been heard to say before putting a bullet in the offender’s skull. Theodore had started to notice he was being short-changed in these transactions and word had got back to Fat Larry. Between them they had agreed that Larry the Snake would get his comeuppance on this particular run. Unfortunately, a further two factors conspired against Jerry. Fat Larry had neglected to inform Theodore of the change in personnel on this fateful run and Theodore had failed to give a description of Al the Snake to his henchmen. They were just told he was Fat Larry’s runner.

So it was, in an incredible confluence of bad luck, that Jerry stepped into Theodores warehouse at just after eight o’clock in the evening. As soon as he had closed the door the hired thugs jumped him, pinned his hands behind his back and slit his through from ear to ear before he could utter a sound. He never saw his attackers, just heard their growling voices rambling about how no-one crossed Theodore and Fat Larry. Did a shit kicker like Al the Snake think he would really get away with it? The last two things that crossed his mind as he slumped to the floor were the following. Why are they rambling on about Al the Snake, which was closely followed by, wow, that spurt of blood from my neck must have gone at least six feet. Then there was nothing.

What happened over the next few hours was very strange indeed. After a while, he couldn’t tell exactly how long, as he had no reference point, Jerry regained consciousness, of a sort. He could hear multiple voices and see feet moving backwards and forwards in his limited field of vision, but found him self unable to move, not even his eyes. Try as he might, he was unable to attract anyone’s attention, so after several minutes of fruitless internal struggling, he decided to relax and listen and try to work out what the hell was going on.

“So, Burt, you reckon he’s been dead at for several hours?” one male voice asked. Jerry thought it belonged to Mr Black shoes who stood to his left but couldn’t be sure.

“At least four, yeah.” Replied Burt, who had a much deeper, gravelly voice. He continued, “Judging by the lividity and the body temperature, I would say time of death was somewhere between 7pm to 9pm if I had to guess.”

“Good guess!” Jerry thought.

“And cause of death was the slit throat? No sign of attack prior beating or poisoning?” Asked Mr Black shoes.

“Unlikely, but I won’t be able to tell for sure until I do the full autopsy. They did a good job on the carotid artery, a professional cut. Looking at the distance of the blood splatter, he was definitely still alive when it happened.” Came Mr Deep and Gravelly’s reply.

“What about murder weapon? I’m guessing a knife.” Asked Mr Black shoes.

“No shit, Sherlock. Jerry thought.

The black shoes approached and stopped near Jerry’s nose. They were so shiny he could just about see himself in them. He wished he couldn’t. Thankfully a man, he assumed it was Burt, came between him and Mr Shiny shoes (Formally known as Mr Black Shoes.) Then a large, overall covered knee plonked down in front of his face, and he then felt a hand grasp his head and turn it sharply to one side. Then fingers began rummaging around in his neck wound. It was an odd sensation, not unlike being at the dentist for a filling. He could feel some pressure, but there was no pain at all.

“The wound is 195 millimetres in length and runs from just behind the left earlobe, across the neck, to under the right mandible. This indicates a right-handed assailant, attacking from behind. The edges are fairly jagged, which suggests a serrated blade, but very sharp, something like a fisherman’s gutting knife. It penetrates in around 25 millimetres at the deepest point.” Burt rattled off these statistics with clerical precision.

“Fuck, this boy is good!” Jerry thought. Then Mr Deep and Gravelly said,

“Okay, that’ll do it for now. Please shut those goddam eyes, you know it spooks me out when they’re all starey like that.” Jerry felt gentle pressure on his eyelids, then it all went dark.

His mind was racing, There must be some mistake how could he be dead? He could still think, hear, and see, he just couldn’t move, feel pain or speak. The conversation went on in the background, but this didn’t really register with Jerry. He was trying to work out what the hell was going on. Could these people be mistaken? Could he be in some sort of... some sort of suspended animation or something? A deep coma, he’d heard of such things in magazines and stuff. Sleep paralysis was a real thing, he’d read about that. These thoughts rushed through his mind, as he was loaded onto what he assumed was a gurney and into the back of an ambulance. His memory was even more patchy after that, he wasn’t sure when he regained his mobility or how he had left the ambulance but had vague memories of the paramedics talking about stopping for a coffee. Next thing he could remember, he found himself wandering the streets for a while and then finding his way into an old, abandoned house. It was here he now resided, trying to work out exactly what to do, how, quite literally, to get his life back.

One good thing about being dead, and Jerry had come to accept that he was dead now, was that he had lost his sense of smell. This was fortunate for a few reasons. The rank odour which he didn’t even know pervaded every corner of this hovel he now called home, a mixture of rotting food, animal and human urine and a variety of other unpleasant aromas. But by far the worst smell was Jerry himself, He was starting to decompose. He knew this from a few signs he had noticed. For one, his skin was turning a peculiar colour, somewhere between battleship grey and olive green with a hint of blue. There had also been a noticeable rise in the number of flies that found him attractive. Plus, bits kept falling off and breaking, not enormous chunks you understand, just the odd ear, tooth or toenail here and there. He was also sure that something unpleasant had hatched and was living in his scrotum. This didn’t bother Jerry enormously, as he couldn’t feel anything. He just saw the wrinkled surface moving about on its own occasionally. Other parts of his body had become fly blown and he had been squeamish at first, but now he just cut them out with a knife. The little white flecks of the fly eggs were the first sign, he probably had some on his back which he couldn’t see, but he really didn’t care, as he could feel nothing. It was just that he couldn’t bring himself to cut open his own scrotum.

Another plus was the fact that he found he no longer felt hungry or needed to eat. He had attempted a drink and some dry bread he had found soon after arriving at the house, but apart from the fact bits kept falling out the hole in his neck, he found he had no digestive reaction, so it just sat in his throat for a few hours. Finally, he had managed to flush it out with a modified shower attachment he had found in the bathroom. Not that it probably would have mattered if he’d left it there, but he was still able to breath although he felt sure he didn’t need to. It was just comfortingly familiar. One of the major down sides was the fact it was bloody boring. He couldn’t go out looking like this and there was nothing to do in this place, but he was still weighing up his odds. Dare he reveal himself as a freak of science, the first real zombie? He’d end up being examined and dissected until he was put on exhibition at the local zoo or something. Jerry had been mulling things over for over a week now and had come to the conclusion that he would go out that evening and try and find out what was going on. Maybe he should return to the scene of the crime. With jogging trousers, a hooded sweatshirt and gloves, he should just get away with it. It was as he was pondering this course of action that there was a knock at the door.

Jerry had been pacing up and down the room and he froze when he heard the knock. Who on earth could it be? Why would anyone be knocking on the door of a derelict house, especially when that door was hanging off its hinges. He waited, expecting another knock or the sound of footsteps but nothing came, until,

“Hello, Mr Carroll, I know you’re in there. May I come in?” It was a monotone voice, which for some bizarre reason reminded Jerry of one of the Monty Python team portraying a civil servant. He said nothing. Who could possibly know he was here? But this was silly, it’s not like he’d committed a crime for God’s sake, he was the victim here.

“Who is it?” he called out in his creaking, raspy voice, “What do you want?”

“My name is Mr Rieper and I have some information which may help explain your current predicament,” came the response. Jerry’s attention was well and truly grabbed now, and he could hardly get the words out fast enough.

“Come in, I’m in the second room on the right.” He heard the creak and bang of the hanging door being pushed to one side, then footsteps coming up the hallway towards him.

Jerry tried to hide himself in the shadows in the comer of the room as best as possible, still unsure of his visitor and self-conscious of his condition. He watched as a small balding man in his mid-forties entered the room, a black brief case clutched in his left hand. Jerry watched him squinting into the darkness; he had a rodent like appearance, a large, pointed nose and dark, deep-set eyes. He appeared every inch the civil servant his voice betrayed him to be, bedecked in a cheap looking, grey, pinstripe suit, which was at least one size too small, and the trousers of which stopped a good inch short of a pair of non-descript black shoes. Placing his briefcase carefully on the dust-layered sideboard, he stepped further into the room.

“Come along, Mr Carroll, I know you’re in here. I’m a very busy man and I need to get on,” said Reiper, in a wearied voice. Jerry responded in his unpleasant croak. 

“I’m not really hiding, I’m just not...very peasant to look at right now.” What appeared to be a faint smile broke Mr Reiper’s thin colourless, lips.

“Mr Carroll, please believe me when I say I have seen just about everything in my time, nothing much shocks me these days.” Jerry hesitated for a moment and then walked forward, and half raised the blind from the window, allowing daylight to flood into the room. Mr Rieper squinted his eyes again, adjusting to the sudden influx of light. After a few seconds he fixed his eyes on Jerry and his thin-lipped smile broke into a full reptilian grin.

“Ah yes, Mr Carroll,” he said, in what sounded like recognition, “Yes, yes, you are in a bad way, quite the worst one I’ve seen for a while, still, unavoidable I’m afraid.” Jerry stared at the strange little man for a moment and then said,

“Excuse me Mr... Rieper, was it?” Rieper nodded, “but what the BLOODY HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!” Rieper stared at Jerry for a moment, stunned by his outburst, then regaining his composure, drew a business card from his breast pocket and handed it to Jerry.

“I’m so sorry Mr Carroll, I was forgetting myself, here’s my card.” Jerry took the card gingerly and read it to himself, it read,

Mr G. Rieper

Authorised Franchisee

Death Inc.

Phone: 1800 IM DEAD

Jerry stared long and hard at the card.

“Mr G. Rieper? Death Incorporated? Wait a minute, you’re not telling me the G. stands for Grim are you.” Rieper sniggered an unpleasant little snigger to himself.

“No, Grim Reaper, ha-ha, no it’s Graham actually. Most people assume it’s the other, but it’s just an amusing coincidence.” Jerry looked up at him aghast. “Listen, mate, there’s nothing remotely amusing about this, let me assure you.”

“No, of course, I’m sorry, very improper of me, it’s just been a busy year and I’m exhausted, frankly.” The little man apologised.

“What exactly are you doing here?” Jerry asked, calmer now. As they had been talking, Reiper had returned to his briefcase on the sideboard and was now rummaging through its contents. Eventually he pulled out a large sheaf of dog-eared documents.

“Well, as you've probably realised by now, you were unfortunately pronounced dead at approximately lam on the morning of the 27th of February 2007,” Mr Rieper said matter-of-factly, studying the paperwork now clutched in his tiny hands. “Due to an enormous backlog of work, we were unable to deal with your case until now and for this we apologise. However, it now falls to me as your officially appointed liaison officer to process your case and forward you to the appropriate location.” Jerry was stunned into silence and didn’t move.

Not looking up from the paperwork, Reiper continued his spiel. “I realise this is a very difficult time for you and all of us at Death Incorporated would like to offer our sincerest condolences. However, as I have said, we do have a serious backlog of cases at the moment, so we do need to get a move on. Could you study these papers and sign them where indicated by the red stickers please?” He held out the pile of papers to Jerry, who took them limply, without glancing down.

“Now of course we have taken into consideration the inconvenience you have been caused as well as the oversight on our part that you died prematurely. Certain members of our facility, whose services have now of course been dispensed with, were supposed to be overseeing the operation, but regrettably let both us and yourself down rather badly.” Jerry turned to Graham Rieper with a look of incomprehension.

“Whoa, back up there a second lil’ fella. Inconvenience! Died prematurely? Let me down rather badly!?”

“Yes, Mr Carroll, I think I mentioned time was of the essence, repeating everything I say isn’t exactly helping.” Rieper replied impatiently.

“Well excuse me, Mr ‘Death Incorporated’, but this is all a little too much information for me to take in right now. It would be nice to be treated with a little respect in my capacity as the recently departed.” Jerry’s attempt at dignity was rather undermined as two plump maggots dropped from his right ear and squirmed helplessly on his shoulder. Rieper leant forward and brushed them away as if they were nothing more than dandruff, not giving them a second glance. He sighed heavily and sat down in one of the rickety dining chairs, a cloud of dust rising up around him as he did. His shoulders sagged visibly, he let out a heavy sigh and slowly lowered his head into his hands.

“You’re right, of course, I’ve turned into a faceless corporate yes man. Exactly the sort of person I detested when I was alive. It was reason I killed myself really.”

“You’re dead, too?” Jerry asked, astonished. Graham Rieper looked up almost smiling.

“Of course I’m dead. You don’t think I could work for Death Incorporated if I was alive, do you? Come to that, I wouldn’t even be able to see or speak to you either.” “But why? Why not go and rest up on a nice fluffy cloud and live out eternity in peace and happiness?” Jerry asked.

“Haven’t you read the bible Jerry? I committed suicide. It wouldn’t have been fluffy clouds, harps and an eternity in peace and happiness for me. I was headed for lakes of fire, pitchforks, and eternal torment. That’s why I jumped at the chance of working for Death Incorporated when it was offered to me as an alternative,” Graham replied. “Ok, so let me get this straight, you were headed for hell but were offered a get out of jail free card if you started working for this Death Inc. and now here you are, ‘processing’ me,” Jerry responded.

“That pretty much sums it up. Look, I’m going to miss my next appointment anyway, but he deserves to wait, died drink driving, crashed his car into a bus load of pensioners. I might as well tell you the whole story. It’s been a while since I’ve told anyone.” He paused for a moment and looked up at Jerry again. “Do you mind?"

“Not in the slightest. I’d be a liar if I said I wasn’t curious,” Jerry replied, sitting himself down in a chair opposite Graham and conjuring another cloud of dust from the cushion.

“Right, where to start? Can I ask you one question? Jerry, are you a religious man at all?” Jerry had to think hard before answering.

“I wouldn’t say I’m overtly religious, don’t go to church, but I suppose I believe there’s got to be something in it all, some grand design with a mastermind behind it all.” 

“Hmm, yes, a pretty standard answer. Well, let me tell you, most of what you read in the bible is complete bullshit. It was taken over and bastardised by a bunch of zealots who weren’t even born when it all happened. Grains of half-truths filtered through, yes, but most was lost in the sands of time. Don’t worry, this isn’t a sermon of true Christianity, just a bit of background. You remember the four horsemen of the apocalypse? War, Famine, Pestilence and Death. When you think about it, there’s a bit of an imbalance there. Three horsemen to go round finishing people off and one, Death, to mop up behind them. It wasn’t too bad in the early days, but as the world deteriorated, death found it harder and harder to keep up. Eventually he took on the Grim Reaper and the Angel of Death to help him out, but with the other three horsemen working overtime, wars, famine, and disease everywhere, even they had trouble keeping up. That’s when he hit on the idea of Death Inc. and franchising out to sub-contractors like myself. It seemed like the perfect solution, especially using people who were destined to be in the company of the dark lord. They jumped at the chance. It was a masterstroke really, the contracts were binding, any funny business and they went straight down the chute to the red guy.

Unfortunately, when we began employing lawyers, they started finding loopholes in the contracts and people escaped. However, this was a bit of a Pyrrhic victory as people soon found out. Once not employed by Murder Incorporated, they were basically just another dead person. So, they were transported to their final destination and for most of them this was usually the fiery pit anyway. They could have saved themselves an awful lot of time and trouble if they’d just broken the contract in the first place. Same end result. Reading the small print in their contracts would have saved a lot of bother. Ironic, them being lawyers really. Anyhow, all this put a serious strain on the business and now we have an unprecedented number of people waiting to be processed. The only way of coping is to allow the world at large to believe the person is dead, store them somewhere and collect them when we can.” Jerry stared at the little man incredulously.

“Well, as you can imagine, I have more questions than a few,” he finally said.

“Fire away, Mr Carroll, I will try to answer to the best of my knowledge,” replied Rieper, apparently enjoying the chat.

“Well, you said I had died by mistake. When was I supposed to die? And is it all laid out as a grand master plan when you’re born, you know when every person is supposed to die?”

“Ok, let me answer that in two parts.” Rieper began, “Firstly, I can’t reveal your intended death day, it’s against the rules, and believe me it would complicate matters considerably.” Jerry started to protest but was silenced as Rieper raised a hand. “I really can’t, Jerry, so please don’t pursue the issue, and anyway, isn’t it a moot point now?” Jerry seemed to accept this, so Reiper continued. “As for the second part of your question. That is not so straightforward. The easy answer is yes; The path of your destiny is set out before you, even before you’re born. But there is a caveat, of course. Your destiny has many inbuilt decisions that you alone can make and will change the course of your life depending on how you make them. Forks in the pathway of your destiny if you like. But there are only a limited number of outcomes, and many choices may eventually lead to the same end.” Jerry considered this and then said,

“Well you’ve already admitted that my death was a mistake in this great cosmic plan.”

“An extraordinarily rare error,” Rieper interrupted. “You would not believe the unprecedented collection of improbabilities and happenstance that had to come together to...Well, the odds are incalculable.”

"Whatever,” Jerry continued, “surely there must be some way of rectifying that error, bringing me back to life, reincarnation, turning back time even. God is supposed to be omnipotent, after all.” Graham Rieper looked horrified.

“You have no idea what you are suggesting! Can you imagine the furore if a person who had been murdered and pronounced dead were to suddenly re-appear? I’m afraid re-incarnation is out. It’s a long story, but that’s one strictly for the Buddhists. Time travel is also a big no, no. Apart from all the paradoxes it creates, making it a logistical nightmare, it’s once bitten twice shy as far as the big boss is concerned. He tried it once many centuries ago and ended up having to get two extra months added to the calendar to sort it out. It was a terrible mess by all accounts and took ages to get things back on the straight and narrow again.”

“So basically, I’m stuffed then?” Jerry said bluntly. “I just get processed and sent on my way, just an admin error by the powers that be to be swept under the carpet and forgotten about. Wed I’ll tell you something, when I meet up with God, I’ll have a thing or two to say and no mistake.”

“Ah, yes.” Rieper said ominously.

“Ah?’ Jerry repeated. “No, no, no, don’t give me ah, I don’t like ah. What does ‘ah’ mean?”

“Well, it’s a little awkward considering the circumstances, but during your life you weren’t exactly a model citizen. Drug running, demanding money with menaces, adultery, not good I’m afraid, you were certainly no angel, so I’m afraid it follows that in death you won’t be either.” Graham replied, an air of regret in his voice. Realisation dawned on Jerry’s face.

“You mean...I’m headed to..." Jerry couldn’t bring himself to say the word, but merely cast his eyes downwards. Graham Rieper nodded grimly, a look of pity now softening his face.

“That, sucks, man,” Jerry understated. “I mean, it all seems a bit unfair considering the circumstances.”

“Well true,” Rieper had to agree, “But to be fair, remember what I said about choices, you and no-one else made those choices and you put yourself in that position of danger.”

“But there must be something you can do," Jerry argued. “Even you must see some injustice in all of this. I’m not, I mean I wasn’t a bad person. Not pensioner murdering, kitten drowning bad. I was just trying to survive in a hostile world. Please, Graham, help me. I mean, given my full time, I may have redeemed myself with some selfless act of heroism, or something.” Rieper looked on seemingly unmoved and Jerry’s heart sank. After a time, his uncaring facade dropped, and he sighed and appeared to be struggling with some great moral dilemma in his mind. Jerry dare not interrupt, he hardly dare even move, waiting for Graham Rieper to speak.

“Well, it is breaking the rules slightly, but I suppose, considering the circumstances no one will say anything,” he turned back to his briefcase, ferreting through its contents once more. As he did so he spoke, not looking up from his search.

“I just need to you to complete some paperwork, sign some forms and I may be able to swing something, but I can’t promise...”

It was a fine, sunny autumn day, crisp, but not unpleasantly cold. Jerry strolled through the park enjoying the bite of the wind on his cheeks, watching red-faced children chasing each other through the trees. He inhaled deeply, savouring the fresh clean taste in his lungs. His eyes picked out two squirrels high up in one of the trees, busily storing food away for winter. He breathed in deeply once more, enjoying the sensation, his hand unconsciously rising and rubbing the almost invisible scar on his neck. Since his brush with death, his senses seemed to have been heightened. He was noticing every single detail and nuance of life. Leaves crackled pleasingly under his tread. It was like being a child again.

He wandered off the path he had been following and noted the subtle change of the grass under his feet, the cushioned softness of every blade. Twenty metres to his left was a copse of trees which surrounded a dense ticket of bushes. There was no one near this particular area, all the activity centred around the children’s playground and boating pond on the other side of the park. Jerry paused for a second, looked towards the bushes, nodded, and changed his course towards them. He quickly reached the densely overgrown area and after a brief scan round to check no one was looking, he pushed a branch aside and entered. About thirty metres away, almost in the centre of the copse, lay the figure of an old man. He had obviously been sleeping rough and his clothes were dirty and ragged. As Jerry approached the tramp, fighting his way through the undergrowth, he realised that having a sense of smell wasn’t always a good thing. Apart from not having had a bath in several weeks, it also seemed the man had found it too much trouble to remove his clothes before going to the lavatory. Eventually the old man was alerted to Jerry’s approach, and he turned his face towards him. It wasn’t a pleasant sight, three quarters of it was missing, a charred mangled mess. Melted hair stuck to the good portion of his face and a large hole gapped in his right cheek. He sat up and looked at Jerry suspiciously with his good eye.

“What do you want, come to torment me some more? I’ve got no money, y’ know!” He shouted at Jerry angrily. Jerry smiled pleasantly and crouched down.

“No, Mr Francis, you don’t know me, but in many ways, I’ve come to help you. However, I do have some rather bad news for you, to do with the bonfire night celebrations last week. Here’s my card, now let me explain...” Jerry retrieved a business card from his suit pocket as he laid his black briefcase down on the ground next to Mr Francis. He continued talking and as he did so, offered the card to the unfortunate man before him. It read

Mr J Carroll

Area Manager

Death Inc.

Phone: 1800 IM DEAD

(Under franchise to G. Rieper Pty Ltd)