[edgtf_highlight background_color=”” color=””]P[/edgtf_highlight]urgatory is no place for a Ferryman.
It’s a colorless emotionless void.
“Dead, then?”
A recognisable voice.
The colorless void remains but two chairs now appear. Tombstone finds himself sat in one, opposite a ghastly looking pale thin man.
“I look forward to our chats, even if they happen rarely.”
“How’ve you been, Death?”
Tombstone’s gravelly voice asks.
Death shrugs nonchalantly.
“Not as well as you, by all accounts. The OSW World Champion. That’s quite a feat more than following orders.”
“Hm.”
Tombstone agrees.
“Are you still following orders, Tombstone? As you know, your resurrection is predicated upon the fact that you’re a Ferryman. You’re required, for now.”
“Why is it that every time we speak, you seek for ways to make my death permanent?”
Death laughs.
It’s sinister.
“You have your job and I have mine.”
Tombstone nods. He respects that.
“I’m still following orders. I’m still the Ferryman. But… I want more.”
Death raises an eyebrow.
“I want more than to simply follow orders like a lapdog. I want more than to be the sum of my duty. Igor doesn’t understand that. Just like Drewitt couldn’t understand why I needed to hunt him, Igor can’t understand why I need to be more than someone who just follows orders.”
“More than a lapdog.”
“More than being told to sit.”
“Told when to stand.”
“When to eat.”
“When to move.”
Death interrupts.
“You’ve lived a long life, Tombstone. Longer than most. If you didn’t follow orders, you’d be as deceased as the souls you ferry. Aren’t you glad to be sailing the boat, instead of a passenger upon it?”
Tombstone sighs.
“I’m tired, Death.”
“I’m weary.”
“I became the OSW World Champion for me. I did that to prove I was more than my duty. It isn’t enough.”
“I’ve seen men like Harold Attano repeat the same vicious cycle of slavery. He’s an attack dog, a lapdog for Zeus, and he’s lost everything because of it. He lost his daughter. He lost his wife. He has nothing because of his duty to following the orders of another.”
“Harold doesn’t have anything for himself. I have no idea if he craves it. But at the end of the night, he returns to his master and is admonished for his failures, just like me.”
Death nods.
“Yet he’s alive, isn’t he?”
“Hm.”
Death stands.
“Beings like yourself and Mr. Attano serve purposes, but you aren’t victims. You made a choice and that choice benefits you, or you’d not have made it. Remember Tombstone, there comes a time when Mr. Attano will stop following orders and there’s a chance that when he does, I’ll meet him. That meeting, unlike this one, will be in permanence.”
Tombstone stands to meet him.
Their presence slowly fading.
“It looks like it’s time to go.”
Tombstone says.
Death grins.
“Be like Harold Attano and follow orders, Tombstone. Do your job… or don’t. Either way, I’ll be seeing you.”
Death vanishes.
The Ferryman folds his arms and awaits his time to return to the living.
And then he’s gone too.