DEALER OF DEATH
A Short Story By
MICHAEL S. GARDNER
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Kindle Edition
DEALER OF DEATH
Michael S. Gardner
Copyright 2011 Michael S. Gardner
No part of this eBook may be reproduced in any form without the expressed written consent of the author.
This is a work of fiction. Any similarities to actual persons or places are unintended.
DEALER OF DEATH
It wasn't until I met death that I came to fully understand the pleasantries of life, all the possibilities that one man could attain with hard work and dedication. In life, I was the harbinger of death, the bringer of fates, unaware that my work could never be complete. In death, however, I found that each chance passed would be revisited, allowing completion of my work, giving the hatred inside that little bit of closure that life could not reward.
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Life, in all its glory and defeat, is something no man should take for granted. I did. I spent my years as a youth paving the road for what would lead to a disastrous, reckless, and uncaring adulthood. I killed. I raped. I tortured. Others' suffering was the only thing that brought me satisfaction in that world where the living roamed. I was effectively the embodiment of true evil, purer than the purest of all that speak or think the word. Too many times I had dismissed what you might call your conscience, not even giving it a second thought. It was like the passenger left behind, hopelessly chasing their only ride that would lead to what could have been and what never will be.
I am all that is not, now. And I enjoy every last bit of it.
The "life" that courses through me is farthest from the word's truest meaning. The death that courses through me—that's a little more accurate, I suppose—brings me satisfaction through the ruination of all that is right, all that is just. By devouring the living, maiming and tormenting all I come across, I come that much closer to being whole, something I don't think I've ever felt before.
All of the Creator's children now fear me, and they know me not by sight but by reputation. When I am near, it's like they can feel my presence. Like they can sense death looming in the air.
As an adult, my childhood delusions of what could be and what should be stuck with me, as if they were tattoos a sailor might wear proudly, maybe even brag about or display on occasion. My tattoos, however, are only visible to those whose last visions of life are of my smiling face, my trance-inducing gaze.
They cry. They plead. Some, though, simply accept death as they would an invitation to a cordial event, with open arms. Most shed tears they wished they never had. And those tears taste of something that should only be obtainable by royalty. And in my victims' dying moments, they see it. They see what no man or woman wants to see.
Death.
Death that is uncaring and numb to all that had ever mattered.
In my life I was the bringer of death, the one that carried judgment when judgment need not have been made. I was why people locked their doors, had their children in by ten. I was why people prayed to a god that never seemed to listen.
My instruments of death had been some crazed illusions brought forth from youthful memories. You name it, and I'd probably used it—or had at least entertained the idea. I struck fear into my victims, having them curse the names of their fathers and mothers for giving birth to them. And in the end, it always came down to this: no pleas, no bribes, no faithful cries ever saved them from what I wanted.