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The woman’s name is Carla McAllister, and she’s not dying as fast as he wants her to.
“Clear,” he says calmly, pressing the defibrillator to her chest. He knows it’s useless, her stuttering heartbeat refusing to stabilize, but hey, he has to keep up appearances. He’s nothing if not a professional, and professionals don’t halfass an attempted resuscitation, no matter how pointless and dumb it is.
He sneaks a glance at his watch. 12:42 AM. He has another appointment in a half hour; professionalism aside, it’s time to wrap things up.
He looks down at the woman’s bloody, bruised face. He thinks she might’ve been beautiful underneath her swollen eyes, her smashed-in nose and broken teeth. It’s a shame, really, that her death would be so ugly.
“Time to go,” he says quietly, and the heart monitor drops into a flatline.
A job well done, he thinks, his eyes flicking over to Carla. She’s staring at her body with blatant horror, eyes wide, jaw slackened. It’s a familiar expression, one he has to deal with all the time. He turns to her as the rest of the staff filter out of the OR.
“It’s time to go,” he repeats, “I’m gonna be late.”
He was right. She really is a beautiful soul.
It doesn’t take long before he’s leaving the hospital to deposit it. Michael is waiting for him at the gates when he arrives up top, arms folded as he leans against the gold-plated railing.
“I’ll take her from here,” he says, dropping the casual pose. Death examines the restless motion of his fingertips, the tense slope of his shoulders that contrasts the easygoing expression fixed on his face. Michael has always been good at the partial obscuration of his emotions, like sunlight filtering through closed blinds. The dissonance is unsettling, every movement seeming the slightest bit disingenuous. His insecurities are going to come back and bite him in the ass one of these days.
“Any reason why you’re confiscating this soul so early?” Death asks.
Michael smiles wider, straining at the corners of his mouth. “We think she might be the mother of the prophecy child.”
If Death had a heart, he’s pretty sure it would have stopped.
“Really?” He asks, trying not to get his hopes up. There have been false alarms before, but Michael is very obviously trying to steady himself, preparing himself for the inevitable. The finale of this long term rivalry between he and his brother. Death grins, bones creaking with the force of it.
Michael turns away. “Yeah. We still need to talk to her to make sure, but her daughter—she matches everything we were looking for.”
Death remembers passing the family on his way out of the hospital. The girl was young, too young to understand what had happened, rubbing her eyes groggily and clinging to a faded blanket like it was a lifeline. She didn’t seem all that special, but who was he to know who qualified as prophecy child material or not?
“Then that means…” he says slowly, mind racing.
Regardless of first impressions, if that girl is really the prophecy child, if she’s really the one with the fate of heaven and hell riding on her shoulders, then that means…
“The end is coming,” Michael says grimly, and Death starts to laugh with unbridled glee.
[13 years later]
“Lucifer did what?” he demands, folding his skeletal arms over his chest.
“Well,” says Marzanna sheepishly, holding her clipboard close to her chest, “my sources indicate that he wasn’t quite aware when the contract was formed, so it wasn’t as if he stole a soul from you on purpose.”
“That doesn’t matter,” he says, teeth clacking together in a feeble imitation of a pout. “That’s one more soul for him and one less for me. I hate him. Who did he take?”
Marzanna glances at her clipboard. “Her name is Natalie McAllister.”
“Ah, yes, I see. Natalie McAllister. Seventeen years old, born October 1st, dies…” Death trails off. “Oh, that’s interesting.”
“Sir?”
“She doesn’t have a date set in stone yet,” he says, drumming his fingers on his arm.
His assistant doesn't look impressed. “That's not unusual, sir.”
“Yes, it’s fairly common, but most civilians usually only have two or three dates in their life that they could die. She has, like, twenty in the next year alone,” Death says, rubbing his chin. “She must be extremely unlucky, but that’s not surprising, considering she managed to get herself paired off with the devil.”
That name, though… It sounds vaguely familiar. McAllister…Natalie McAllister…
He flashes back to a rainy night in a hospital, the small child looking groggy and confused as her father collapsed onto the tiles. The beaten, bloody face of her mother. Michael’s reluctant confirmation that the end was to approach within the girl’s lifetime, that there was something special about her.
The girl. Natalie McAllister. The prophecy child.
“Oh,” Death says, letting his hand drop to his side. “Oh. This will be very interesting, indeed.”
The first time the girl almost dies, it’s from being pushed off a roof.
He watches silently as Lucifer recoils from the precipice, slamming into her and throwing her off the opposite direction. He could laugh at how mundane it is, a freak accident sending her tumbling to the ground with enough force to break her neck. Definitely not a suitable end for the girl who was supposed to bring…well, the end.
Lucifer twists around and catches sight of the girl, reaching out to him with wide, scared eyes. Death waits for the sly grin to appear as she drops, waits for the knowledge of impending freedom to sink into him, waits for him to turn away as she cracks her head open on the ground.
But, strangely enough, he doesn’t do that.
Lucifer looks at his falling contractor, arm outstretched, and he reaches back.
His eyes widen as he fails to grab her, hand grasping empty air, and she falls, hitting the ground with a dull thud.
Death stares at Lucifer, his hand still lingering in the air as if he could catch the ghost of her. His mouth opens and closes silently, eyes panicked. It’s an unusual look on him. Death can’t say that he likes it.
He sighs, striding past Lucifer’s underlings to the girl. She’s a heap of limbs on the ground, like a broken doll. Blood drips from a deep cut on her forehead.
He thinks about Carla McAllister’s beaten face, hair and blood plastered to her forehead like a scarlet crown. The girl looks so much like her, mouth slack and face bruised. He could easily take her, snatch her from Hell’s grip on her soul. Honestly, she might consider it a blessing.
He hears another muffled thud against the ground. Lucifer. He takes a tentative step towards the girl. Up close, Death can see the concern in his eyes, the slight trembling of his hands. It’s bizarre; they’ve been contracted for what, a month? Not long enough for her to have any value to him.
But maybe there is something special about that girl.
Whatever it is, Death can’t see it. He supposes he’ll just have to wait to find out.
“Another day,” he decides, and walks away from her still body.
The scene: Oregon, United States, 3:21 PM. A bridge, stretching over a reservoir of some sort. Natalie McAllister, leaping off of it with a frenzied determination.
He sees now why her life wants to end on so many different days.
Lucifer is stained in red, swirling eyes protruding from his skin and jagged horns. Hell is clearly fighting to take hold from him, but Death sees the clarity in his eyes the moment she jumps. His wings tear through his shoulder blades in a blaze of fire, blood trickling down his back as he falls after her.
What an idiot.
Lucifer catches her, curling his arms protectively around her just moments before they plunge into the reservoir. Scalding heat bubbles to the surface. Underneath, angry red burns form on the girl’s skin, boiling water filling her lungs. Death is surprised that her soul doesn’t leave her body right then and there.
Lucifer drags her to the surface, face solemn. She looks small in his arms, withered and burnt like paper set aflame.
“I didn’t take you for an eavesdropper,” Lucifer says quietly, glancing up at him. Death stiffens for a moment before turning around.
Archangel Raphael, poison flickering under his skin like lightning, gives Lucifer a grimace. “You owe Gabriel a large favor, brother. He is risking a lot bringing me out here to you.”
Lucifer says nothing. Death sees his grip on Natalie tighten.
“Why are you regarding me with such cold eyes?” Raphael asks. “It’s imperative that I work on her quickly. If not, we are sure to get a third, even more skeletal visitor.”
Death pretends not to notice Raphael’s eyes flicking towards him. There is an unspoken warning in his words.
Do not show yourself.
He huffs indignantly. He had been kind enough to spare the angel’s life. He shouldn’t be the one making demands. Regardless, he turns away from the scene.
“You owe me big time, Ralph,” he mutters, and drifts away.
“How’s my schedule looking, Marzanna? Any big jobs?”
She glances down at her clipboard. “There’s due to be a plane crash in two days over the Pacific, and it looks like there’s a budding serial killer in Milwaukee.”
He groans. “Another one? Serial killers are fun, sure, but Wisconsin is quite possibly the most boring place on Earth.”
“You say that about a lot of places.”
“Because it’s true.”
She sighs, jotting something down on the paper. She looks so professional. Maybe he should get a clipboard, too.
“A woman’s set to be murdered in Seattle,” she announces.
“So?”
“The child with the death hands is going to be there.”
If Death had a nose, he would have wrinkled it in disgust. “Ew. I don’t want to be anywhere near him. Have someone else cover it.”
“Got it. Oh, and sir?”
“Yes, Marzanna?”
“It’s February.”
“So?”
“Natalie McAllister. You have her scheduled for Saturday.”
“…Oh.”
“Are you going to postpone it again, sir?”
“I’m not sure,” Death says honestly. “It depends on whether it’ll bring the end or not. I can’t have her dying prematurely and ruining everything. Why are you looking at me like that?”
“…I’m concerned that you’re getting a little too involved with this human,” Marzanna says, pinching the bridge of her nose.
“That’s not my fault! How am I supposed to stop her from falling off of things?”
“By killing her,” she says flatly. “Saturday. Please consider putting that poor girl out of her misery.”
“Fine,” Death says. “I’ll consider it.”
“Thank you.”
“You know, you’re too kind sometimes, Marzanna.”
“I’ve been here almost as long as you have,” she says, looking back down at her paperwork. “I know what life will do to people like her.”
Blood covers asphalt, bright red and glowing in the lamplight. Her neck hangs over one shoulder, hands outstretched—perhaps to pull the long, jagged spear out of her stomach.
He thinks of touching fern fronds in the cold and watching them twist inwardly as they wither. They curl into circles, cowering fruitlessly from the coming frost. The girl does it too, makes an armor of arms and legs to shield her already bleeding wound. Her knees hit the ground with a soft thud.
“Wh…what happened?” she whispers, eyes glazed over.
Death kneels beside her. “Don’t worry,” he says. “Just close your eyes and let it all play out. It’s easier that way.”
Behind her, he sees Kristi Lange fall to the ground, a skewer protruding from her abdomen as well. Hm. Maybe he’d be taking two souls today.
His thoughts are derailed by Lucifer. He arrives in a fury, his small hands ripping the spear out of Natalies stomach, elbow colliding with the man’s face.
“That hurt, you asshole,” he seethes, rage lighting up in his eyes.
Michael arrives soon after, and its all a mess, honestly. He can’t say that he doesn’t enjoy Lucifer’s little rage-fest, but the fun stops as soon as the devil sees his contractor, spattered in blood and curled up pathetically in Michael’s arms. Her bottom lip trembles, fat tears dripping down her cheeks.
Lucifer looks like a kicked puppy. It should be hilarious, but Death doesn’t feel anything as he gently takes her from Michael, eyes wide and scared.
Michael nods solemnly at him. Death can’t help but feel like an entire conversation happened in their eye contact, in that simple movement. A compromise. An understanding.
Lucifer turns, Natalie cradled in his arms, and disappears.
Michael turns to face Titus, expression stony.
Death sighs, and lets himself fade.
“…Again? Really, sir?”
“Humans are fascinating, Marzanna. I want to see how all of this plays out.”
“If you say so.”
Natalie McAllister’s voice is calm when she gives her soul away.
Walls of fire surround her, her hair singed and loose around her face. Her expression is burning, as much of a force of nature as the flames laying this warehouse to waste.
He sees it now, how this child can bend destiny in her hands.
He can feel her slip away. She’s out of his jurisdiction now. Marzanna will be disappointed that he had waited so long, that he had damned her with his selfishness.
Well, Death thinks, looking at the devil’s awestruck face, I wasn’t the only one.
April 4th. A dinky motel room in a small, uninteresting coastal town.
Lucifer weeps inside of it.