This is a prequel to the Badland and does not make much sense without previously reading that story.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Death taps its finger impatiently on the table, staring coldly into your eyes. You called her here, a disjointed code sent in red slashes along your wrist. She came, as you expected, but you stayed her hand, kept yourself on that tightrope between alive and dead, a pinky dipped in the realm of the underworld, just so you might talk to the reaper herself.<\/p>\n
She hasn\u2019t spoken yet, but neither have you. What would you say to her, afterall? Do you start with formality? A hi or hello?<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re\u2026 Death?\u201d A stupid question, an obvious answer, but something to break the ice.<\/p>\n
Yes.<\/em> The voice trailed for eons and yet cut short of her ears. Somehow you knew death had said that, yet could not hear her voice.<\/p>\n \u201cThen\u2026 Can you help me?\u201d There is a shiver in your voice as it travels across the wet tiles of your bathroom, out of the door and across the table in your bedroom to her skull.<\/p>\n I would think it\u2026 Unlikely. <\/em>Whispers of its words make their way to your mind, but they do not come from her. It is as if she had translators, tiny beings floating around your head translating her thoughts to yours.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s about your sister\u2026 In the Badland. I want to save my grandma from her.\u201d Death seems taken aback, though she made no obvious gesture to suggest this. Again, it is simply as if you are made to understand her, without any effort to do so.<\/p>\n You want to take a person away\u2026 from suffering? Child. This is not something you should consider doing.<\/em> It is weird to feel concern from a creature entirely focused on removing your very existence from earth. Yet, you don\u2019t dislike the comfort it brings.<\/p>\n \u201cI am. I did this to bring you hear only so I might ask this of you.\u201d You gesture to the red bathroom, your red wrists.<\/p>\n And if I say no?<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cAt least I tried.\u201d<\/p>\n And why\u2026<\/em> The syllable rumbled through you, like the bass at a gig. \u2026should I say yes?<\/em><\/p>\n \u201c<\/em>To get back at your sister?\u201d You don\u2019t really have a plan further than this, you\u2019ve already pushed your luck to the edge thus far.<\/p>\n I will take you to the Badland \u2013 as a reward for your foolish courage, nothing more. You will make your way through to your grandma personally, then \u2013 you, and your grandma, will die. Do you understand?<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cI do.\u201d<\/p>\n Good.<\/em><\/p>\n The red on your wrist froze over in an icy blue flash, and you rise to your feet, never once taking your eyes off death. She approaches you, gliding inches off the floor, only seeming to tower further and further over your head, looming like the shadow of a great spire. Her boney fingers rest on your shoulders, and you feel your entire being tugged into the ground, sinking into nothing. You close your eyes as the air is crushed out of your lungs, and when you reopen them, all you see are waves crashing against the cliffs. The boney hand shoves you over the edge, and you fall down, down into the crashing waves and wet black rocks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" This is a prequel to the Badland and does not make much sense without previously reading that story. Death taps its finger impatiently on the table, staring coldly into your eyes. You called her<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":340,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[32,6,115],"class_list":["post-339","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-short-stories","tag-horror","tag-short-stories","tag-zdzislaw-beksinski"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6OILo-5t","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.tompass.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/Death-herself-e1583677754926.jpg?fit=708%2C556","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.tompass.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.tompass.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.tompass.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.tompass.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.tompass.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=339"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.tompass.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":341,"href":"http:\/\/www.tompass.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339\/revisions\/341"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.tompass.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.tompass.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.tompass.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.tompass.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}