PART 1 | PART 2

Michael quietly stepped through the gate, walking down a dark, shade‑filled passageway. The passageway opened into a spacious clearing. In the center, spirits crowded around a tall stone structure, at the peak of which sat three men, presumably judges determining the ultimate destiny of the dead.

As Michael stepped forward, a booming voice on his right announced, “The mortal clearly wishes firsthand acquaintance with my wrath.”

Michael turned to see the great lord Hades on his adamantine throne, the queen Persephone on his left. Their dark robes hung over their bodies, flowing onto the floor around them.

Hades’ piercing eyes were fixed on the intruder. “Perhaps he desires early admission to Tartarus, hm? Or maybe he would prefer the pursuit of the Furies?”

Persephone eyed these proceedings with obvious interest. She linked her arm around the dark lord’s and leaned closer to him, her pallid lips whispering into his ear. “Let us see why he comes, my husband.”

Hades stated simply, almost as if the idea had been his own, “Speak, human. What is your purpose?”

“Well …” Michael hesitated for a moment, avoiding eye contact with the fearsome deity. Then, he stuttered out, “Well, Mr. … that is … Lord Hades … I come seeking Valerie O’Connor.”

Underneath the heavy beard, Hades’ mouth twisted up in a vague sort of smirk. “A woman,” he said. “How original. Let me guess. Your recently departed love?”

“Well …”

“Rhadamanthus.” Hades turned to one of the three judges. “We have this … Valerie O’Connor?”

A bearded man on the stone pedestal quietly flipped through a book, searching intently. After a few moments, he looked up, saying, “Yes, Lord. She arrived here, recently.”

“I should like her present.”

Rhadamanthus gave a slight nod to an unseen being somewhere in the midst of the shades. There was immediate motion, but the crowd of the dead made it difficult to make out exactly what was going on. It seemed that spirits were hastily moving aside to make way for something else that was traveling through their midst. Soon, the crowd opened, revealing a twisted hag—possibly one of the dreaded Furies—accompanied by a single shade.

Michael turned his head aside to avoid having to gaze upon that horrible countenance.

Picking up on this, Hades grinned a small, cruel grin and said, “This is merely Megaera. Pray you never have to meet her sisters, as well.” He then nodded to the creature, who promptly receded, disappearing into the crowd to attend to other matters.

The spirit who had accompanied Megaera came forward before the lord of the Underworld, in whose presence the ambiguous shadow lifted, revealing the earthly form of a short, dark‑haired woman, possibly in her mid‑forties. She was dazed at first, struggling to adapt after being jerked through various levels of reality, but soon came to herself, blinking in confusion.

“Michael …?”

Hades looked her over, his intense eyes seeming to absorb every aspect of her being. “I expected more.” He turned his attention back to Michael. “But I suppose you intend to tell me of a love surpassing all others, an emotional bond that not even death can break. You think to tell me, as every other lover I’ve ever met, that your love is special, stronger, more intense than any on earth, hm?”

“Well …”

“Am I right?”

“Well …” Michael shuffled his feet in the dirt, feeling a bit silly. “We’re not really lovers …”

“Oh …” For just a moment, the great lord almost seemed to be taken aback. “Who is she, then? A sister? A cousin? A close friend?”

“She’s my boss.”

Hades said nothing. Persephone sat quietly by his side. Even the murmuring of the shades ceased. Aside from a brief scream of suffering echoing from somewhere in the farther reaches of Tartarus, the Underworld appeared to have gone silent.

Valerie stared at Michael in puzzlement. “Why are you here? You don’t look dead.”

At some length, Hades blurted out, “Explain yourself.”

Michael made every attempt to sound elegant and convincing, but found it to be a bit difficult given the circumstances. “You see, Mr. … Lord Hades … We’re in kind of a pickle. The deadline for our weekly paper is tomorrow morning, but without our editor, we’re basically screwed. Nobody else knows how we’re supposed to lay out the ads … No one knows how to do the proper format for page one … And I’ll be damned if I’m going to be the one who has to deal with the board of directors.”

After an uncomfortable pause, Hades said bluntly, and mildly awkwardly, “No.” It wouldn’t occur to him until later that he’d just missed the perfect opportunity to make a joke about already being damned.

“Michael …” In shock and horror, Valerie was finally starting to get the gist of what was going on. “I don’t really want to go back … I actually kind of like being dead.”

If Michael heard her, he didn’t show it. Instead, he continued his negotiations with Hades. “Now, I realize what I’m asking is a bit … unorthodox … but we’re really desperate, here. Look, if you like, I can talk with some of the board members. We can probably arrange some sort of deal. I’m sure I could convince them to relinquish, say, a 20% share in the stock. I know, we’re a small paper, and our profits may not be as much as, well, chartering dead souls across the river, but I think …”

“No …” Hades, wide‑eyed, turned briefly towards his queen.

Just as dumbfounded as her husband, Persephone apologized, “I’m sorry … I was sure he was in love or something.”

Trying desperately to regain his composure, Hades turned back to Michael and said, “No. I’m sorry, but this sort of thing’s just not done.” He paused for a moment. “I don’t know … I suppose I should punish you and stuff …”

Michael sighed heavily. A powerful surge of frustration was rushing through his body. “Look, Mr. Hades … I didn’t want to come to the Underworld. My coworkers voted, and I got stuck with the task. Why? Because I’m the only man in the office. Really. They talk about equality, but when it comes down to the dirty stuff, why is it always still up to the guy, huh?”

“Look, sir …”

Ignoring the interruption, Michael continued, ranting, “Why is it always ‘Michael, come lift this heavy crate?’ ‘Michael, go down to the Underworld.’ ‘Michael, come step on this spider.’ I don’t even like spiders! I …”

Valerie, still trying to make her point, interjected, “Michael … I slaved away the last twenty years of my life in that place. That’s twenty years of deadlines, twenty years of board meetings. I did the bills, I dealt with unsatisfied advertisers, angry letters to the editor, I installed software on the computers, I put the toner in the printers, I cleaned the carpet that time your little nephew threw up in the office. For the past twenty years, I’ve been stuck with every problem, every crisis, every unpaid bill … I tell you, Michael, if that car hadn’t killed me, the stress would have. I’m sick of it. I’m tired. I’m done. All I want now is for everybody to just leave me alone and let me rest in peace.”

Once again, quiet filled the Underworld, not even the screams of the tormented daring to interrupt it. It was Michael that broke the silence, speaking to Hades. “There has to be some arrangement we can make.”

Her eyes widening, Valerie blurted out, “Michael!”

Hades shook his head, his beard waving against his chest. “I’m afraid it is poor practice for the lord of the dead to return souls to the earth.”

“Well,” Michael reasoned, his brain desperately searching for any logic that might help him to achieve his goal, “it’s not like she has to stay or anything.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well,” Michael said, “I’m to understand that you’ve got your wife, here, on a sort of a shared basis.”

Persephone’s eyes dropped awkwardly.

“You only get her for six months, right? The other six months, you have to let her go topside.”

Hades grunted unhappily.

“Well,” Michael continued, “it’s not like we need her for that long, or anything. We really only need her for the deadline. Say, you send her up every Tuesday, and you can keep her down here for the rest of the week.”

Valerie was speechless, her jaw agape, but Hades pointed out, “It doesn’t even seem that she desires to return with you.”

“Well, can’t you punish her or something?”

Hades simply stared at the man, unblinking.

Michael said, “Well, you do that here, don’t you? Punish the wicked? I mean … Why here, right? Coming topside can be … You know … Sort of like her community service.”

Hades considered this and, turning to the three judges, said, “Minos, Rhadamanthus, Aeacus.”

In response, the three judges all began carefully studying their records, intently considering every detail.

Still speechless, Valerie stared at Michael, who merely shrugged and cast his eyes down. Somehow, saying sorry just didn’t seem like it would help anything.

The judges began discussing things amongst themselves, comparing each others’ notes. After a few minutes, the one on the left turned to Hades and said, “Lord.”

“The girl has sinned?”

“It seems she was wont to watch a television program in which a group of men play cruel, and sometimes obscene, ‘practical jokes’ on unsuspecting innocents. My associates and I have determined this material to be unsuitable for viewing.”

“I see,” said Hades, “and how often was she known to watch this program?”

The judge turned his attention back to his notes, studying them briefly before looking back up and announcing, “Every Wednesday at nine o’clock.”

Hades nodded, then, turning towards Valerie, declared, “In light of this new evidence, I have no choice but to decree that, since the defendant sinned once a week, she shall henceforth be punished once a week by being required to finish the newspaper in question in time for the appointed deadline.” After a moment, he added, “Oh, yes, for all eternity.”

In shock, Valerie stumbled and fell to her knees, as Michael heaved a sigh of relief at having successfully accomplished his task.

Persephone elbowed her husband’s left side and stared intently at him, a look of accusation clearly showing in her fierce eyes.

Hades turned to look at her, paused for a moment, and shrugged, saying only, “What?”

*****

One Tuesday later, Valerie O’Connor stood at a counter explaining to a baffled customer the definition of the word late. “I’m sorry, sir, but the deadline for accepting classified ads was at noon, yesterday.”

The disgruntled man said, “But the paper doesn’t come out till Friday.”

“That’s Thursday, actually,” Valerie corrected, “but it’s printed on Wednesday, the deadline for getting it to the printer’s is tomorrow morning, the classified page is already done, and we have ten more pages to lay out.”

“Uh‑huh,” the man answered, “well, do you think maybe you could squeeze it in?”

Valerie explained, “If we put another ad in, it will throw off that page, the classifieds will have to spill over onto another page, which we’ll also have to completely redo, we’ll have to move material from that page to another page, which would throw it off, forcing us to redo it as well, probably taking out important stories in the process, all so you can tell people about your yard sale that doesn’t happen for another two weeks anyway.”

“But the paper doesn’t come out till Friday.”

Valerie sighed heavily, holding her head in despair. She’d had this conversation before and knew there was only one way it could turn out. “We’ll see what we can do.”

“Well, I’d appreciate …” The man hesitated, studying the despondent expression on Valerie’s face. After a moment, he said, “Hey, didn’t you die?”

THE END

posted by arthbard at 9:23 pm on Saturday, October 3, 2009

Labels: Fiction, Humor

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