Chapter Text
Belly down, no pants, bed hair. Andy Sachs preferred to be comfortable when she was applying for jobs. She’d be needing a decent enough one soon, or she’d be out of New York on her ass with a one way ticket (paid for by her parents) back to Nowhere Special, Ohio. A few had caught her eye, and it was just as she was circling her preference that she realised what time it was.
Whipping out of bed and into a brisk shower, Andy hurried through her routine to a job interview which was in an hour. She couldn’t miss this interview even if she was struck by lightning, that’s how lucky she was to land it at all. This appointment might be the solution to her woeful under-preparedness to pay rent alone. It could be life-changing for her career, a great head start—
—7:52AM—
“I’m gonna miss the subway!” Andy heaved on her way to the door. Her door clicked shut, but the ringing of finality was too slow to catch the brunette on her descent to the lobby and out the door in the direction of the subway station.
Andy made the train.
Her timing was perfect.
The train ride was only going to be something like eleven minutes long.
It was cut short, naturally, due to the explosion.
Death felt like floating down a cold river then being scooped up by an enormous warm hand. Andy had barely gotten sense of her whereabouts when she was suddenly looking into the furnace of creation, a frosted iris. The eye had a name, she’d learn later. For now, the eye was weighing her life with a set of gold scales in a black abyss, and then nothing.
Not quite nothing.
An interrogation chamber, identified easily by the mind-numbing blue haze settled over the room and the coffee stained table. There was no mirror, no door and no one on the other side of the table. Andy looked down at her person, soot covered, torn clothing. Blood. Only a little. Her midsection was rusted red, her hands and fingernails filthy with fire and blood stains. She felt no pain. Felt nothing, really, not even confusion. She was simply waiting.
And then she wasn’t.
“Andréa, I assume?” came a voice from the seat opposite. A woman was sat there now. Andy hadn’t noticed her arrival.
“Yes.”
“Of course. I am Miranda, though you can call me whatever you like. I noticed in your evaluation you have no religion you subscribe to, not very spiritual either, I see. Most people call me Death or something else pedestrian.”
“I’m dead?”
Miranda looked at her.
“There was no way anyone would survive an explosion like that. Especially so close to the bomb.”
“There was a bomb?”
“I forget how dull you all are in these first few moments.”
Andy looked down at her hands again. Then to the walls which were still that horrible blue. She was dead. She was not only dead, she was in the afterlife… Or, an afterlife, she amended at the lack of other people.
“Is this what the afterlife is, or am I here for a random survey…?”
Miranda’s lips twitched at that, and only then did Andy realise the woman had a face. A pretty face. Stern.
“You are here to do a job. You are hardly qualified, but there isn’t anyone else with a mind like yours. It’s not optional.”
“Oh. I guess I have a lot of spare time now. What is it you want me to do?”
“It isn’t about want or need. You will be an agent of mine on earth again for a time until I’m satisfied with the fruit of your efforts or you complete seven of my tasks. Until such a time, you will be withheld from the true afterlife. You need to sign here,” Miranda said, handing Andy a stack of thick, smooth paper.
“I can’t say no?”
“Usually you would, but as I’m the decider of such things, no.”
Andy signs with the golden fountain pen beside the stack, just curling the final ‘s’ of her name before she looks back up at Miranda.
“Doors closing, please stand clear.”
Fulton St Station glided by as the sound of the subway leaving began to register in Andy’s ears.
“Ma’am? Can I sit there? Ma’am?”
“Huh?” Andy mumbled turning to look at the woman trying to catch her attention. She had a duffle bag and a trolley and looked like she’d give birth at any moment. “Oh!” Andy scrambled so stand for the woman, moving out of the way quickly and down the carriage to stand next to a handrail. She was grateful that New Yorkers were totally oblivious to any and all unusual behaviour, especially as the woman must have called out to her more than once.
“Try to be more put together in future,” came a low, voice from the man beside Andy, holding on to his own handrail. Andy tried to recognise him by build, but she didn’t know anyone that broad and tall, or anyone who wore such an expensive looking suit. Then he turned his head, and instead of the face of a stranger, Andy looked into Miranda’s just barely familiar face.
“Sorry,” was all Andy could think to say at the sheer bizarreness of her morning.
“I suppose it’s only expected. Your first task is when you get off the train. That woman’s water will break in the chaos of the changing lines. She will recognise you and ask you to get her to a hospital in a taxi. Your task is to say no and walk away from her.”
“What? Why!?”
“You are here to do as you’re told, not ask questions. Do this and comfort yourself by knowing there will only be six more tasks. Should you fail, I will make the next one remarkably more difficult.” Miranda turned away from her and faced the front of the carriage again without another word. Andy tapped her (him?) on the shoulder.
“Hey, wait, what do you mean I have—”
“Do I know you?”
The face that turned the second time was that of a man with average features and styled hair. Probably a wolf of Wall Street, by the look of him.
“Oh, sorry. I thought you were someone else.” The man frowned at her and gave her a once over. He probably thought she was on drugs.
“That’s fine,” he said before turning and walking forward a little to stand.
Andy bit her nails as she subtly watched the pregnant woman, who only stayed on the train for a measly two stops before standing with some difficulty and disembarking. Andy followed at a short but natural distance until they made their way into the chaos of the station atrium. It was quite impressive how quickly the scene unfolded just how Miranda said it would, and before Andy could truly collect herself, her arm was bring grabbed and the woman was asking her to take her to the cab rank.
“—My water broke, please you have to help me—”
Andy’s heart raced at the desperation in the woman’s face, and every atom in her body urged her to reach for her hand and guide her to the taxi rank, but Miranda’s eyes were sharp in her mind. She could almost feel the frosty gaze on her back (and knowing the situation she was in, Andy thought it more than likely that Miranda was watching her somehow).
Andy placed her hand on the woman’s own, still gripping her arm, and even witnessing the woman’s poorly placed relief, Andy removed the hand and began to walk away and out of the station, disappearing relatively quickly in the sea of people. The woman was shrill by the time Andy had made it to the exiting gate, but a quick glance down the staircase helped Andy to see the woman being taken care of by a slew of strangers. It made her feel marginally better before she slunk out.
As she broke the surface of the city, it clicked for Andy that she was in a part of town she doesn’t know her way around. She didn’t want to go back into the station, so she decided to walk for a bit, maybe come to terms with what was happening to her before catching another train. Or maybe a bus.
Honk honk!
Andy looked to the row of taxis waiting outside the station and immediately caught the gaze of Miranda, who was blessedly appearing as she had in the Interrogation Room, which Andy had come to think of as limbo. She slams the door shut as she enters the cab. Which is just as well, as Miranda wastes no time in pulling out into traffic and driving away from the station as swiftly as possible.
“A little finesse would have been ideal,” Miranda grumbles from the driver’s seat. Andy looks at her in the rear-view mirror, flabbergasted. “I only said don’t get her a cab, not leave the poor thing in labour in the middle of a station rush.”
“You—”
“Never mind now. I suppose you did do as I said. I’ll count that one, but have a bit of elegance next time.”
“Elegance. Right.”
Andy watched the streets of Manhattan trail by as she rode in the taxi. She let her mind wander about everything humans thought they knew about the afterlife and how wrong most of it was. The afterlife was a taxi ride at the moment, and before it was a subway ride. Andy had always wanted to go in a helicopter when she was alive, so maybe she could cross her fingers for that.
“The next task is complicated.”
“Complicated how?”
“I need you to shoot at someone.”
“WHAT!?”
“Don’t yell at taxi drivers, it’s very poor taste. Ah ah,” Miranda said, holding a single gloved hand up to silence Andy’s protests. “You don’t need to actually shoot him, but he’d certainly deserve it if your aim is poor enough to not warrant a choice. Just don’t kill him under any circumstances.”
“I can shoot a gun, thank you.”
“Good,” Miranda said unaffectedly, looking one more time at Andy in the mirror before turning her attention to the road and hitting the accelerator. Andy gripped the door handle and the seat beside her, gasping at the pace Miranda was driving at as she looked out the window and watched it blur.
“Slow down, you’ll crash us!” The brakes on the taxi screeched to a halt at a red-light intersection, flinging Andy forward against her seatbelt and narrowly avoiding dying (again) by impacting the passenger seat. “What on earth—”
“Sorry, miss, these brakes ain’t workin’ right all of a sudden. Are ya okay?” came the elderly voice of her driver. Who, of course, was not Miranda. Taking deep breaths, Andy managed to collect herself enough to forgive the old man for the malfunction. It was hardly his fault.
“That’s alright. I might get out here, though, if that’s cool with you,” Andy says, studying the sidewalk she was about to step out onto.
“A’course, miss, and don’t worry about the fare. I barely took you halfway out to where you wanted to be.” Andy nodded and smiled before absently exiting the taxi.
It was as she thought once she took in her surroundings. She was no longer in Manhattan, or even 2006.
The oppressive heat was the first clue. New York got hot in summer, but not like this. And New York never had so many casinos. She’d wanted to go to Las Vegas for ages, Andy supposed before wandering along with the foot traffic on the sidewalk in the direction the taxi was taking her before. Looking down at her clothes Andy discovered she was no longer wearing jeans and a simple button down, but a lovely long skirt and a light blouse that allowed a slight breeze. Her shoes were simple and slightly heeled, which accounted for the clacking Andy hadn’t noticed. She had a purse too, and one short glance inside revealed that it carried a six-round revolver, which posed a bit of a problem. Andy had never used a revolver before.
If her only stipulation was to not kill this man, whoever he may be, she might be in for more of a challenge than she thought. Trust that woman(?) to leave out almost every crucial detail of the task before thrusting her forty odd years back in time. With a goddamn revolver.
A diner on the street caught Andy’s attention, so she decided to sit there and procrastinate or simply opt to live out this limbo in Vegas until Miranda came for her. It was a pretty enjoyable experience to walk into such an old-fashioned diner, one Andy’s parents might’ve frequented before they’d had her.
“What can I getcha,” came a familiar voice. Miranda, guised in a yellow apron dress over a white t-shirt with a messy blonde ponytail and a notepad appeared beside the booth Andy had sat in. Her nametag read Mandy, which was probably the weirdest part. Miranda did not look like a Mandy at all.
“An orange juice for now, please,” Andy replied as casually as possible. Mandy wrote it down on her pad and then blew a bubble-gum bubble and skipped off, mentioning something about “right away, ma’am.”
As if Andy was old enough to be a ma’am.
Miranda was hasty, it seemed, in bringing her order, as not even a minute later saw Andy with a tall glass of orange juice, ice complete and a black straw in front of her sat atop a coaster.
“Gotta be fast now, the lunch rush is about to come in,” Miranda said, looking at Andy meaningfully. “It’s about to be fuller than a can of sardines in here. Hard to even notice people comin’ an’ goin’.” Andy nodded and took a sip of her drink, frowning when she tasted nothing before realising she was technically dead. Mandy looked intently at Andy’s coaster then back into her eyes before saying something rote every waitress says and walking away.
Elegance.
Andy waited to surreptitiously glance at the underside of the coaster where three dot points had been written in neat, round cursive.
- White baseball cap
- Blue shirt
- Red beard
Andy sighed and took another sip of her tasteless juice before attempting to look busy in deciding what to order from the menu. Mandy hadn’t lied. By the time Andy was ready to place an order the whole diner was full of people making orders to take away and sit-in. It was unbelievably busy and looked like it’d stay that way for some time. Andy worried she’d miss the man Miranda had assigned her to shoot at, but he was unmissable.
He didn’t look to be remarkable in any way until he spoke. He was almost certainly from Alabama, and almost certainly as racist as he possibly could be in any situation. Andy still didn’t feel good about shooting at him, but it made it sort of easier. Sort of. The man settled into the last booth at the very back corner of the diner, and barked an order at another waitress, watching her lewdly as she walked away. Andy decided it was going to be quite easy after all, at least on her conscience.
There were far too many people in the diner for it to not be going against some type of WHS clause, and as it were, Andy was frightened of killing more than one person if she shot the gun right now. But Miranda, disguised as the sweet, uninterested waitress, provided Andy with the perfect opportunity when she went to the counter to pay for her juice. It was completely separated from the seating areas, which was rather inconvenient for Andy. She’d stick out like a sore thumb if she shot from there.
“Not stopping for a bite to eat, ma’am?” Mandy said. Andy squinted her eyes and opened her mouth to quip back something that was certainly witty before Mandy spoke again. “You know where he is,” she murmured lowly as Andy reached into her purse for the bill and a tip. “3, 2… 1. Oh my god he has a gun!”
Andy waited for everyone to turn to the man in question, before Andy shot a single bullet that hit the back of the stuffed booth seat (a typical red pleather) before slinking out the door in the chaos of the rest of the patrons fleeing. She made it down the street and caught a bus that was just about to take off.
“I have enough for a fare,” she said hurriedly. “I just have to get—”
“The bus is free, ma’am.” Andy looked up to Miranda’s normal face, the one she first saw her wearing. “Have a seat.”
Andy sat in the middle of the empty bus and remained silent as the bus drove and drove for hours, until Andy felt her eyelids grow heavy in the fading afternoon light.
Still the bus drove on.