I Am Death (completed)

Chapter 2: I Have Many Names

There are many names out there for us, the Angel of Death, Grim Reaper, Azrail, Thanatos, Shinigami, Santa Muerte, either way I am one of many. It is fate that chooses us, not the life we have lead or the years we have lived,  nor the choices we've made. I was chosen as a child, after my death I was unable to pass on with my family, the man who I have come to know as father couldn't ferry me to what we only refer to as the Eternal, and so he knew that I was to become one of Gods angels.

Whether God is really out there I cannot say, if he is then I have never met him, and he has never spoken to us, but I like to believe that he's real, and that one day he'll allow me to be with my family again.

At first it was hard, coming to grips with what I now am, having to see the spirits of the dead pass through our plane of existence, what they call Limbo. Then father taught me how to guide them, how to talk to them and comfort them, he says that comfort isn't necessary, but I think it should be.

After a while he showed me how to move between planes, or dimensions, whatever you want to call them, and step into the mortal world. That was a great struggle, I could hear and see them, but they could not hear or see me, they would move through me, like I was dead, and then it hit me, I am.

Soon he taught me to take a physical form, so that I could be seen and heard, but it took awhile for it to sink in that I'm still not alive. He showed me that I have no pulse, that when I touch things I can't feel it, and when I eat I can't taste, surprisingly I was okay with that. But, there was another hard lesson to learn, sometimes when a mortal touches me in my physical form, I can get a premonition of sorts, showing me their death, it happens every once in a blue moon and sometimes can be quite disturbing, it's enough to remember my own death in great detail, I don't want to see other people's.

In the mortal world I would start to age "we are affected by time there, the only escape of time is in our world, and the Eternal" my father had told me, I'm not sure how it works, but I suppose the spirit does age too.

"All wounds are healed here" he referred to Limbo, when I saw Sebastian I saw that his burns were gone, many mortals leave their physical wounds behind when they come here, I suppose it would be cruel to make them carry them to the Eternal with them.

With every soul that we ferry into the Eternal, their voices stay with us, those are the voices I hear in my head, the souls of the dead. They're grateful to us and choose to advise us when we need it, however we have no control over when they speak, sometimes it can be inconvenient, but considering they're all dead I think that earns them a pass.

It took years after my training to convince my father to allow me to go to school, he didn't see why it was necessary, but it's rare that children are picked to play the part of Death, and so there was no rule book he could consult. The voices advised me to stay away, that I should focus on my practice, but one can die of boredom in Limbo (so to speak) time stops there and it's impossible to have any kind of fun.

There's a lot to learn when it comes to being what I am, a lot to discover and deal with, I can never tell a mortal soul what I am, and I can never save a soul I'm meant to deliver to peace, but I did... I broke one of the biggest rules we have, all because of the look in his eyes, because he was brave. Many souls are brave, but there was something very different about this one, my father would never understand, he rarely does. One might think it trivial for two Angels of Death to do, but my father and I often argue, once I told him that he's not even my real father, and that was the only time I ever saw true hurt in his eyes.

Our eyes are fairly lifeless, and to see that hurt in his, I knew what I meant to him. He sat me down and explained it all to me, something I'd begged him to do so many times before "when you were unable to pass on with your family, I knew what you were to become, and that because I had found you, I'd have to teach you our ways" my father has done this for many Reapers, he's lived for thousands of years and has managed to keep his middle aged appearance on account of the fact that he rarely passes into the mortal realm.

"After an apprentice has mastered the craft, the teacher is to cast them out, to work on their own. But I saw you, and I knew you were mine. I knew that I had to raise you now, and protect you. Most Reapers appear to me as adults, you were the first child I had taken under my wing" although he hadn't had a part in creating me, after hearing those words I was convinced that he is my father, he had broken the rules for me, he didn't cast me out like he was supposed to, he kept me because he loves me.

Sometimes he even tells me of his life, the one he lived before he died. He told me of a woman, a woman so beautiful that all the stars in the sky couldn't compare, that her eyes were deep like the blue oceans and her lips were red like the warm blood that once coursed through our veins. But they had been separated, and he died from some ancient disease. Here he waited in Limbo for the day that she died, unable to find her in the mortal realm.

Soon he gave up, years had passed in the mortal world and she was no where to be found, so he continued with his work until one day he heard his name in a familiar voice. The woman he once hoped to marry was standing there in white, like an angel, exactly as he remembered her. She told him that she lived a happy life, she married a man of wealth and birthed three beautiful children, for the third child she died giving it life, but she didn't regret it. She wasn't sad, or scared to pass on. My father longed to keep her with him, but he knew she didn't belong in Limbo, he only wanted peace for her.

I always loved that story, but it brought me great sadness that I didn't find love before I died, I'd like to have known love, before I'd known death.

A/N: there are a lot of beliefs surrounding the Angel of Death. Man or woman? 1 or 1,000? Good or bad? Tell me about how you've always imagined Death in the comments, or your favourite story, legend or myth! - Lokimakerofmischief