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"So, does it hurt when you come back?"
"What?" The pause lasts just long enough for Fiona to look at Matt like he's stupid and him to consider that he may be. "Oh, that. Of course it does. I fucking die."
"I meant the coming back part, I know dying hurts, idiot."
"I don't think it's ever hurt. Just sore when I wake up. You've done it too, haven't you? That's why you're here. Unless you lied to Geoff somehow, in which case that'd be an awful long con you've got planned to ruin it by asking me a dumb question."
"Yea, I was just curious. All the ones I've heard you guys talk about seem different, so I wanted to know if it'd be different next time I did it too."
"You've only been here for a few months, and I know we've got seemingly infinite lives here, but that doesn't mean we go around letting our coworkers die for no reason. I'd give you at least another five months before you should start worrying about that."
Fiona lets out a hard laugh. "Coworkers, like we work in an office. I'm not worried - can't be any worse than the first time."
"You've only done it once?" Matt's given another look and he shakes his head. "Nevermind, what happened the first time that was so bad?"
"I never fell asleep. I started coming back the instant I died. I was jumped, you know, think I mentioned that before, by some guys I must have stole something from, and they were just kicking the shit out me and someone whipped out a knife and hit the right spot a lot sooner than he meant to, fucking amateur, and I died. So I felt all of that, right, hurt like hell, then I don't even fall asleep. I felt my bones piecing back together and my skin covering my flesh and my blood just, I don't fucking know, replenishing itself at a stupid rate. Didn't feel any better than getting beat up, certainly felt unique. Gave those dipshits a real scare before I slaughtered them, too scared to move. That's why Geoff found me so quick. He watched it happen."
There's a long pause, now, before Matt says, "He's always in the right place, isn't he?"
"Would have been a lot better for me if he'd done something before I got my ass beat, but that's fine. He told me it was the fastest he'd ever seen anyone come back. Told me you were the slowest."
"Hey - I'm not - I'm not the slowest. I'm sure there's people out there slower. Any dead person could come back and we don't even know because their magic hasn't worked yet."
"150 years, Matt? 150? That's, like, seventeen different variations of Gavin."
"You can't - you can't turn around and judge me based on how often Gavin just completely changes his whole look and personality."
"He was seventeen people while you were dead from a little bit of blunt force trauma!"
"It wasn't blunt force trauma, it was blood loss, so jot that down-"
"Jot that down, what does that even mean, I don't have paper or anything, why would I write anything you guys tell me down it'll get you in some sort of government facility or something."
"-and Gavin's a totally different person just on the day to day, anyway, so it doesn't really count what he says is an era of him or not, okay?"
"Hey, I told you my story, you gotta tell me yours."
"I didn't really mean for you to tell me the whole story."
"You asked and everything! You gotta. It's illegal not to. I swear to God, Matt, I will go to the police with this violation of my trust."
"That's an absolute lie, you have no trust in me and don't even pretend otherwise."
"Maybe so, but they don't know that."
"Look, look, okay, so it's the year 1792 and I'm chilling in this, like, park area near town, alone because you know most people my age had already gotten sick and died because that's what we did back then, then some fuckers who, I don't even know why and I'll never know why because there's no records of what happened other than some footnote in the newspaper like 'old Matt disappeared today, weirdo', anyway, didn't like me I guess, there was two of them and I knew them, but we weren't friendly or unfriendly, they come over to me and they're talking then one of them just whips out his gun and shots me, which is such a stupid way to die at that time it should have at least been a duel, then the other one does it too, and they drag me off so I guess I don't soil their honor or whatever what with the non duel gun death, and bury me in the woods and I fall asleep at some point during the burying but I wake up later and I'm like 'weird I'm healed now. I guess a witch helped me or something' and I come out of the woods and everyone's looking at me because I'm dirty and dressed weird and I'm thinking it's been, like, a day to a week, right?, but I'm talking wrong and acting wrong and dressed wrong and covered in dirt and I'm looking around town, which has drastically changed, and I see, like, cars and shit and I just scream so I turn and ask this guy what year it is and where I am and he's like '1942' and I lose my shit and that guy turned out to be Geoff."
"If it wasn't Geoff, do you think they would have had you committed?"
"Oh, anyone else and they absolutely would have just ended my ass. I'd be chained up to this day."
"I wish they'd have let me have, like, just one of your months. You could have spared it."
"That last month was essential in making sure I didn't have maggots growing inside of me."
"Yuck! Why'd you have to say that?"
"How can you think about anything other than how nature used me as whatever it wanted for that century and a half?"
"Because that's gross and I don't let myself think of gross things, dude."