Spires of Infinity
By Eric Allen
Prologue
Of all the ways to die, Gabriel never expected to meet his end as a gory mess
splattered across the front of a Greyhound bus. Of course, no one really plans on dying like that, except for a few very disturbed individuals. Most times, it just sort of happens.
One moment Evanescence is blaring in your ears, and you’re thinking of the hot paralegal wearing an outfit millimeters away from being immodestly unprofessional, who let you rip her CD . . . biblically. And the next you’re flying through the air in bloody pieces.
Roadkill, if you will.
“Son of a—” was all he had time to utter before being hit by that nonstop
Greyhound express straight to the afterlife.
He would have liked to say that his life flashed before his eyes in an endearing montage with some sort of soft, yet powerful music playing in the background, tugging on the audience’s heartstrings. Instead, everything went blank.
And that was the end of it, dead on impact. Gabriel Reeve died a bloody and
meaningless death. Fade to black. Roll credits.
Chapter 1: A Second Chance
That should have been the end of it, but it wasn’t.
Spinning end over end, Gabriel found himself hurtling downward through cold,
wet mist. The air whipped his expensive haircut and even more expensive suit behind him with a sound like a flag in a windstorm. Fighting against the pressure of the air rushing by, Gabriel found himself unable to breathe. He couldn’t even scream.
Crazy thoughts rushed through his mind. He was reasonably sure that he’d just died. People didn’t normally walk away from pedestrian versus gigantic metal behemoth.
Only, he was going down, not up. According to his childhood preacher, Heaven was in the other direction. A bad sign.
Bursting out into open air, Gabriel found himself far above a lake of picture
perfect blue. Near the shore was a humble house atop a hill with a massive tree behind it.
Carpeting the rolling green hills beyond was an expansive cemetery. He could make out a man dressed all in black fishing at the shore.
Gabriel had been sky diving once before, and began to remember the classes
before the actual event. When free falling, the best way to even out and slow his fall was to spread his limbs wide to make as much drag on the air as possible. Stretching out his arms and legs, he felt his fall both stabilize and slow enough for him to finally draw a breath.
Greedily he drew in huge, deep gasps of air. When he no longer felt lightheaded, he did what any sane individual might do in his predicament. He screamed bloody murder the rest of the way down. Just before hitting the surface he pulled into a tight ball to keep from being splattered for the second time in as many minutes.
Slowing his fall just before he plunged into the icy water, Gabriel felt an unseen force take hold of him. Freezing cold shocked him so badly that he was unable to move.
He drifted up to the surface and when his head finally broke through he began coughing and spluttering. At last he overcame his shock and began treading water.
Looking toward the shore, Gabriel saw the man in black watching him with mild
amusement.
“A little help here,” Gabriel called.
The man shrugged before casting his fishing line again. “You’re fine. Just make your way slowly toward the shore. You’re close to the shallows.”
Gabriel began swimming toward the shore. It was not long before his feet
brushed the bottom. He winced as his handmade Italian shoes sank into gooey mud.
When he reached the shore, he bent over with his hands on his knees, panting heavily.
The fishing reel clicked with a steady rhythm as he cleared his nose and lungs of water.
Glancing up at the overcast sky, Gabriel wondered how he’d survived the fall.
More to the point, he was standing in a completely ruined suit that cost more than some people made in a year, and he was reasonably sure that a bus had just killed him. What in the hell was going on?
Looking the man in black up and down, Gabriel saw that he was tall and ruggedly handsome. Several days of stubble darkened his face, and his straight black hair was held back with a frayed red cord tied at the nape of his neck. Weariness seemed to loom over him like one of those little rain clouds that followed cartoon characters around. His most striking feature was his purple eyes.
“This may sound really crazy,” Gabriel said. “But, uh, I just died.”
“That you did,” the man in black looked up from his fishing pole to fix Gabriel with a strange stare. “I’ll spare you the details, but I have been given authority to sort through the people on their way to the afterlife for those that may be of use to me.”
Gabriel stared at the man. “Did you escape from a mental institution? Wait.
You’re not God, are you?”
“No. I am the Northern Sage, lord of time and space. To put it in terms you’d understand, I’m something more like middle management. Even God doesn’t have time to do everything, after all. Right now we are existing outside of what you consider to be normal time and space. One day every person must pass through here on his way to the afterlife, but I have the power to take the ones that interest me. I have a job for you, and you just might have what it takes to get it done.”
At those words, the voice of Joseph Reeve rose up from the dark depths of
Gabriel’s consciousness, where the horrors of his childhood stagnated and festered. The impulsive desire to do everything that the Sage said struck him, if only to prove his worthless father wrong.
“So you’re the one that dropped me in that overgrown puddle,” Gabriel pushed
the voice in his head away. “Do you have any idea how much this suit cost!”
“Do you have any idea how little I care? I could send you to your reward in the afterlife if you prefer. But between you and me, you’re probably not going to like that very much unless, of course, you’ve got a fetish for fire and brimstone.”
Gabriel clamped his jaw shut to prevent the string of profanity that was on its way out. In his opinion there were two types of curse words, the lesser ones and the greater ones. The greater swears included such four letter originals as the F word and the S
word. The lesser group included everything else. He reserved the greater group for situations like the one he found himself in now. He also liked to know the origins of his curses. It made him feel more sophisticated in using them. For instance, the F word was short for Fornication Under Consent of the King.
“All right then,” the Sage continued. “You’re a slimy, self-centered, sociopathic, unchaste, vain, champion of evil. Was that what you sought when you set out to become a lawyer? As things stand you’re bound for a very warm locale. However, I am unable to leave this place, and there is something that needs to be done outside. I must, unfortunately, work through proxies like you. Here’s the deal. You go where I say, and do as I say, and maybe, perhaps, you’ll score enough points with the big guy that you’ll earn your redemption and avoid going to hell. What do you say Gabriel Reeve? Will you serve me with the chance at redeeming your soul?”
“Wait,” Gabriel reached into his sodden pockets. “I have money. I have lots of money. I can pay you to let me go back to my life, without the bus of course.”
“A bribe,” the Sage laughed. “Look around, genius. Does this look like Earth to you?”