text: [Themes: sci-fi]
  
  You sit an old chair, staring out the window of a shitty New York foster home. Your eye gazes out at the falling snow as your fingers trace a circle in the air out of boredom. You see a flying object off in the distance. Maybe it's a plane, or a bird. Maybe it's him. The Crimson Cape.
  
  "Mia! It's time for dinner!" a voice calls from the stairwell behind you.
  
  "I'm not hungry," you reply softly, your gaze shifting.
  
  "Mia, you need to eat," Gertrude says, as she appears just at the edge of your vision, carrying a plate.
  
  "I'm not hungry," you repeat.
  
  Gertrude sighs, and sets the plate down, before walking off. You listen as the stairs creek as she walks downstairs. You wait until she's gone before leaning over and grabbing the plate to inspect your meal: Fish Fingers and Potato Waffles. You eagerly dig in: you're starving, despite what you said to your newest caretaker. You just don't want to sit at that big oak table as the other kids go through their days, describing boring interactions with friends and telling stories as banal as the discovery of a dead rat outside their school. You can't deal with people right now.
  
  You continue staring out the window for some time. What little light the pale winter sun provides is snuffed out by darkness, and once again Gertrude appears at the top of the stairs.
  
  "Mia, it's time for bed," she says, already knowing what the response will be.
  
  "I'm not tired."
  
  "Mia, you can't spend the rest of your life sitting in that chair," Gertrude says in a soft, pleading voice. "Can you just go to bed?"
  
  > Refuse
  "I'm sleeping here."
  
  "Fine. At least go brush your teeth while I get your bandages ready."
  
  You walk into the bathroom, and grab your toothbrush. You're forced to use your elbows to squeeze out the toothpaste onto the brush, but it only takes about a minute's work. You brush your teeth quickly, before Gertrude arrives again, carrying a small first aid kit. She opens the clasps and takes out a roll of bandages and a scissors. You wait as she snips the bandages wrapped around your head and they fall to the floor. You catch a sickening glimpse of your face in the mirror. A fleshy, bloody cavern where your right eye once was appears, before Gertrude quickly wraps fresh bandages around it, obscuring your view. Gertrude cuts off the bandages wrapped around the burnt stump of your left arm, and quickly replaces the charred flesh with clean, white bandages.
  
  "There!" Gertrude says with a smile. "Have you brushed your teeth?"
  
  Mona walks into the bathroom, grabbing a toothbrush and beginning to brush her teeth, before looking at you.
  
  "Where are you sleeping tonight, Mia?" she asks.
  
  "Where do you think?" you ask sarcastically.
  
  "Hey! Improve your attitude, missy!" Gertrude says, and you shrug.
  
  Gertrude walks over expectantly to Mona as you put your toothbrush back.
  
  "What?" Mona asks innocently.
  
  "Give me your phone, Mona. The last four nights you had it, you haven't got a wink of sleep."
  
  "I get loads of sleep!"
  
  "Sixteen year olds need an average of eight to ten hours of sleep a night, and you're barely getting half that. Phone!"
  
  Mona rolls her eyes and hands Gertrude the phone. You would hand her your phone, but it was smashed to pieces after you threw it full force at Simon, another kid fostered here, in a fit of rage. You leave the bathroom, and find comfort in your chair again, staring out at the dark, cold world.
  
  "Goodnight, Mia!" Gertrude says.
  
  "Goodnight," you mutter, already closing your eyes.
  
  > Sleep
  Gloves wrap around your throat as you awaken frantically. A masked man dressed completely in black stands above you, holding a long, incredibly thin blade in his hands. He lunges towards you, the blade stabbing straight for your throat.[Themes: mystery / thriller, fantasy, mystery, humor, romance]
  
  I had finished preparing a lovely young woman who died after being struck by a carriage just outside on Main Street. The ordeal had been surprisingly not gruesome, given her tight corset and big skirts which had protected her soft flesh from the sharp, front corner of the carriage.
  
  She had, however, been hit head first, knocked unconscious and then ran over by the rear wheels.
  
  The driver had been upset, had said that the young woman dashed into the road as if she desired to be hit. But no one knew if she desired to die.
  
  I think the driver had gone slightly out of his way.
  
  Regardless, I was not the police, who arrived at the scene some twenty minutes later. And I had not witnessed the event. I was actually coming back from lunch when I saw the police folk outside my shop.
  
  But I had not necessarily a shop. I was an undertaker. I suppose my shop could be a shop, just for the preparation of the dead and payment thereafter.
  
  Perhaps I rather dealt the dead.
  
  This young woman was twenty-nine. Her name was Edithe Zilonis, and she had no known relatives.
  
  Police believed she was from out of town but had searched the local cities for anyone of the same surname. They found absolutely no one. She hadn't any personal belongings other than a small purse with her name stitched within it, and some coins and a bottle of perfume. It was in the safe and I would set it into her hands when the time for her funeral came.
  
  But I did not know if this dear Edithe Zilonis would even have a funeral. The carriage driver had come back twice to check on her. Perhaps he would ask for a funeral for her, but that meant he would also have to pay. And the man seemed kind but not too kind.
  
  It was unfortunate for everyone, because I just cleaned up a corpse and would not be getting paid. I assumed.
  
  So to soothe my lamenting, I spoke softly to Edithe Zilonis.
  
  When I first met her I said to her, "Hello Miss Zilonis. I'm your undertaker. I hope your stay will be pleasant for you. You are very beautiful, and that is a shame."
  
  And Edithe Zilonis was very beautiful. She had fair skin and blonde hair. Her eyes were brown had they not been bloodshot, and she had a small frame. She had not had any children, from what I could tell, and very little stress either. Her skin was soft and her dainty little face had no wrinkles or blemishes. It made my heart sink.
  
  Poor girl, I thought, You could have had anyone at your feet, and now you're dead.
  
  I was curious. I was very curious most of the time. I revelled in the stories of my clients. I loved hearing what families had to say about their sweet Leola, or handsome Damon. How Tessy was such an affectionate grandmother, and how Alford had been taken from us much too young, Gods bless him.
  
  I loved these stories because most of them were just stories.
  
  I allowed the families and friends and lovers to relish in their pleasantries, but I knew the truth. I knew the dead far more intimately than the living.
  
  > Leola Viles
  Leola Viles was forty-three when she died of asphyxiation at the hands of a man twenty years older than she. The darling woman had marks on her neck I had to generously cover with makeup.
  
  She seduced married men and drowned her newborn in the wishing well out on the Old Road when she was sixteen. She was unmarried and could not stand the thought of raising a child all alone, because married men were bound to get into trouble at some point.
  
  The man who had killed her had been just another tick on her lipstick case, but he had been truly in love with her. When he found out she was no loyal housewife, he strangled her on the balcony of his three-story home in Middletown. He admitted at court he should have pushed her over, but I'm glad he did not. Broken bones are hard to mend after someone dies.
  
  Her mother had said to me, Leola is the gentlest, kindest, most honest woman you'd ever meet.
  
  Well that's sweet of you to say, Mother. She told me she loathed you.
  
  > Continue
  This Edithe Zilonis was stubborn. I began to think that she intended to run in front of that carriage, as if it would have magically stopped once she was there. It did, but it stopped her too.
  
  I added some rouge to her cheeks to liven her up. It was pretty on her white skin. Then I tapped at her cheeks, tried to wake her.
  
  Usually I can prod someone only a few times before he or she awakens to speak to me. This Edithe Zilonis required not exactly a slap on the face but not exactly a pinch either.
  
  And when she awakened, she slapped me on my face. I recoiled and held my face.
  
  Usually they don't awaken with such ferocity, but Edithe Zilonis certainly did.
  
  I hollered and Edithe Zilonis cried, "Why did you hit me? Who are you?"
  
  As far as I understood, the dead are aware that they are dead. Lost souls aren't lost, they just aren't sociable. And howling ghosts are just having a bit of fun. But Edithe Zilonis was furious I had awakened her.
  
  Usually they're only furious when they're old and prepared to die. Edithe Zilonis was quite quaint being dead, and at least old folks can't hit hard.
  
  I bit back the faint tears in my eyes and said, "I'm your undertaker. It's a pleasure, Miss Zilonis."
  
  "Why did you hit me?" She demanded again.
  
  She had a heavy eastern accent. It was charming, except she was shouting.
  
  "I didn't hit you," I said.
  
  "Oh you certainly didn't pinch!" she argued.
  
  Perhaps I could focus her anger on something else. I hoped I could, lest she strike me again.
  
  > say "Why did you run in front of that carriage?"
  "That is none of your business," Edithe Zilonis argued.
  
  "It is very much my business," I said. "I'm your undertaker, and I deserve to know more than anyone why you would do such a thing."
  
  For a moment she was silent, as if she was not willing to tell me.
  
  But it was because, "I don't know."
  
  She didn't know.
  
  "Well," she started, "it's not that I don't know, it's that I don't remember."
  
  A dead person who does not know why she killed herself, or if she did at all. I was suddenly fascinated. My stinging cheek seemed to subside.
  
  "You don't remember," I said.
  
  "I don't remember," she snapped. "Should I? I don't know how this all is supposed to happen!"
  
  "A dead woman," I said, "who doesn't know why she died. Well this is unprecedented."
  
  She seemed offended, but softened when I knelt beside her. I looked closely at her head. I wondered if her being struck on the head had anything to do with her forgetting. But dead folks are fully capable when they are dead. How could this Edithe Zilonis be any different?
  
  "Did you have to take off my clothes? When you. . .undertook me?" she asked.
  
  I smiled at her. She bit her lip and turned away from me.
  
  > Continue
  I offered Edithe Zilonis to come and join me in my study if she so desired. I also offered to put her back to sleep, but she decided very quickly she was not ready, so she skittered along behind me to my study.
  
  My study was on the second story of the shop, as was the rest of my life that didn't involve embalming the dead.
  
  Most of the dead are not ready to die. But most of the dead come to accept it rather quickly. Most of the dead, I heard, go to Heaven. Some of the dead haunt the Earth in exchange for their souls. And some of the dead argue with me until three in the morning on how they should still be alive.
  
  I am referring to a particular Terrence Pauling, who decided he would extend his time on Earth by arguing with me until I forcibly put him back to sleep some three hours after midnight. I had already been working late and the bastard was getting on my nerves.
  
  That is not to say, however, I was not amused by him.
  
  Between his bouts of cursing me and my family, flirting with me, and sobbing so loud I might have thought my neighbors could hear him, he did amuse me. He was incredibly vibrant for a man of forty, who suffered the death of his wife and daughter only a few years prior. In fact, I thought he would almost want to die, perhaps so he could see them again.
  
  But he told me, I'm going to the Hells. I just know it.
  
  Edithe Zilonis was quite amazed by my book collection.
  
  She said, "You've got an awful lot of books about dead people, don't you?"
  
  That was true.
  
  > Life and Death: Eternal Limbo by Orly Rankin
  I flipped through the chapters. Most of my books I had read multiple times.
  
  Orly Rankin had a lot of nice things to say about the dead, but her theory on the Eternal Limbo fascinated me the most.
  
  The Eternal Limbo, or the bridge between Life and Death, could possibly explain why Edithe Zilonis did not remember why she dove in front of that carriage.
  
  The theory states, The dead can sometimes occupy both the living and dead worlds. They are not spirits, as spirits are soulless. While truly dead, the person can be aware of his or her surroundings, but ultimately confused as to how he or she came to be dead.
  
  Rankin went on to speak about how only certain types of folks can see the dead in this state. But I needed to know how to cure it. I flipped ahead. Edithe Zilonis wandered behind me, would sometimes peer over my shoulder.
  
  If such a dead is encountered, it is wise to persuade him or her to continue on to the afterlife, whether that is Heaven or the Hells, Purgatory or another place of their beliefs.
  
  Well, thank you, Rankin, but I had to know why Edithe Zilonis died.
  
  > The Dead and Their Deeds by Lisbeth Mccullough
  Lisbeth Mccullough was very spiritual. I had her book because I had met her. My copy was in fact signed, the only signed copy that existed, as far as I knew, and the only signed copy of any book that had been signed after the author's death.
  
  She signed it for me, kissed me, before she fell back into her eternal slumber.
  
  Mccullough was of my personality, intelligence and fascination with the dead. I quite admired her.
  
  She wrote, The dead sometimes can not transition if they have unfinished business. This is commonly remedied by the friends and families casting a farewell spell, or having the dead person speak through his or her traumas.
  
  Very good. I quite admired Mccullough. But all I had to find out was why Edithe Zilonis just couldn't remember.
  
  Mccullough continued: Occasionally, a dead person has no idea how he or she came to be dead. In my years I have only met one person who defied these laws of the dead. My knowledge does not extend very much into the rules and laws of either Heaven or the Hells. I casted a memory spell upon this dead person, and it seemed to work.
  
  Edithe Zilonis asked why I had cursed aloud. She was sifting through my cupboard.
  
  "I'm not a spellcaster," I said.
  
  "That's funny," she noted, "because you brought me here, didn't you?"
  
  "Two very different things, I'm afraid," I said.
  
  "What do you plan to do?" She asked.
  
  "Well, do you really want to know what happened?"
  
  I had asked that because if she wanted to know, I had an excuse to find out. Else, I would put her back to sleep and be done.
  
  But is an undertaker's work ever truly done?
  
  "Yes, of course! How thick are you?" Edithe Zilonis scolded.
  
  > Spellcast
  "I never heard your name," Edithe Zilonis said to me as she sat down on the couch.
  
  It was a nice couch, if old and a little worn. I had recieved it in the will of my grandmother, who also gave me a tin of mints and a couple dollars. She was frugal, and put the rest into investments I had yet seen anything from. She also specifically requested that I not be her undertaker.
  
  I had pulled up a chair beside Edithe Zilonis and opened Lisbeth Mccullough's other book, Various Spells for the Modern Witch.
  
  I was no witch, so my hope was all but null. But I would give Edithe Zilonis my best. It was the least I could do for her.
  
  "Well!" she started.
  
  "I'm sorry, I was reading," I said.
  
  "What's your name?" she demanded. "Do you just want me to call you My Undertaker? You've already seen me nude, it's the least you can offer me."
  
  I quite liked being impersonal with the dead. I had no reason to become attached. A name was a step in a direction I was not fond of.
  
  "I like My Undertaker," I said. I smiled but Edithe Zilonis was having none of it.
  
  "I don't. And I'm about to have unfinished business," she said.
  
  She folded her arms in front of her. She was cute. For a dead woman, she had a big personality.
  
  "Ire. . ."
  
  "Your name is Ire?"
  
  ". . .mortuis. Ostende mihi faciem tuam memorias," I said.
  
  Edithe Zilonis was about to curse at me.
  
  > Continue
  Edithe Zilonis' eyes turned a brilliant gold, shone so brightly I could hardly see them. Her expression flattened, her body froze.
  
  "Edithe!" I called. I moved towards her, grasped her shoulders.
  
  "It was a man," she said, in a voice far less eastern and much deeper and unfamiliar.
  
  "A man?" I asked.
  
  "Yes," she said, "he was tall, he had a top hat. He was behind me. My purse."
  
  "Your purse in the safe," I said.
  
  "My purse!"
  
  Edithe Zilonis fell backwards. I caught her. She seemed dazed.
  
  When she came to, her eyes had shifted back to their brown irises. It was surreal to me. I had embalmed witches before, broken a few spells, but none had spoken to me as if they were possessed.
  
  "Are you alright?" Edithe Zilonis asked me.
  
  "Quite swell. And you?" I asked Edithe Zilonis.
  
  "Well yes, I was just listening to you."
  
  "Edithe, you just told me there was a man, and your purse. Do you need your purse?"
  
  "I'd like to have it, yes," she said. "What man?"
  
  A tall man, I told her, recited back to her what she had done and said to me.
  
  "Am I magical? Like you?" she asked.
  
  I was not sure she was, but I was not sure she was not, either.
  
  She said, before I left to fetch her purse, "You had your hands around my waist. Do you plan on inviting me to dinner?"
  
  > Continue
  I actually tripped on the second to last stair, which was crooked sideways and had been since the building had been renovated. And I knew it was, and I hadn't tripped on it since I had moved in.
  
  I moved some six years ago into this shop and its apartment. I had the freezers built in, and a large safe placed in the far wall, so that if the building caught on fire, the safe would be the first to burn.
  
  The combination was four-five-one-twenty and then eight. The numbers had some deeper meaning I had since forgotten, but I had remembered the numbers.
  
  I was musing over Edithe Zilonis and hardly realized that I had unlocked the safe without thinking. In fact, for a moment I stood as if I had forgotten why I was there, standing in front of my Safe of the Dead. It was as if my mind was severely unfocused even though I was quite focused. Or at least, I thought I was quite focused.
  
  So it took me even longer to realize that Edithe Zilonis' purse was no longer there within the safe.
  
  Articles of the dead tend to go missing, not usually but it does occur. Perhaps a wandering dead will find her ring, place it on her hand and leave me to wonder how I had just set it down on the table beside me moments before.
  
  But disappearance of articles only occurs with objects exceptionally partial to the individual. I was no writer, but I could write that in my own book on the dead whenever I decided to publish one, I believed it so.
  
  Perhaps Edithe Zilonis had taken it when she went upstairs with me. Although how she could have opened the safe was beyond me.
  
  > examine the safe
  I peered closely at the safe. It was an old Herring Safe, at least a century old. I got it cheap when an old barber told me to take it off his hands. He was planning on pulling insurance fraud by leaving a few too many candles lit at his shop.
  
  He didn't tell me what he planned to do, but he said he had removed all valuables from the inside, and usually had a box of matches in his pocket. I also met him again a week later but he was half-scorched and dead too.
  
  The safe was an odd dark red color. However, it was not originally red. The red paint was chipping, revealing the steel beneath it. Why anyone would want to paint a perfectly good safe red of all colors was not something I pondered, especially not at that moment.
  
  The safe could not be moved by myself. It was as tall as I was and weighed a good bit more than I did too. But I looked at the frame and all about on the inside. The only peculiar thing was that there was a relatively new scratch above the lock, as if someone fumbled to get it open.
  
  I sighed. Perhaps I had been robbed since the morning and the culprit had already left, or was waiting behind me ready to bash my head in, desiring to steal my embalming fluid I supposed.
  
  It was not often when I was startled. I prefer to think that in all my years of working with the dead, nothing could scare me by then.
  
  But I absolutely jumped when Edithe Zilonis put her arms on my shoulders and shook me, yelling, "Boo!"
  
  She said, "I'm like a ghost, see? Did I scare you?"
  
  "Absolutely not," I said.
  
  > Continue
  "I didn't find your purse," I told Edithe Zilonis. "And it's strange because I swear I