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No one knew how it happened. It wasn't even possible to think of such an event. But they did it anyway. For the amusement of everyone in the Afterlife, including themselves, if, of course, an indescribable shock can be called that.
Life and Death became parents.
No. They didn't just find some baby somewhere or steal one. They exactly made their own kid.
When it comes to the children of Life, which are all mortals and other earthly creatures, no one even listens. Here everything is very clear, boring and ordinary. But when Death was involved in this deal, then the matter took an interesting turn.
Of course, he got the most questions. Edgy questions. About this very thing, right. But he never confessed to anyone how he did it there. Perhaps Life has worked for two. And literally overworked, as a result.
No one will ever know.
In any case, what has happened cannot be turned away — the two strongholds, the earthly Alpha and Omega, the irresistible, merciless and boundless forces, had a son.
During birth, however, there was a problem — the baby was born not dead and not alive. Which, honestly, was no wonder, with such relatives.
The little boy was heartless — just like his mother.
And with his face, he took after his father — a smooth, shining skull with cunningly narrowed eye sockets was as if created to sell it to someone's collection and put it on the shelf.
In general, some fright turned out. Life often, frankly speaking, had nonsense came out instead of the usual things, — maybe because of her inattention, maybe because of her perverted tastes, or maybe even out of interest, — but who would have thought that their own child would turn out to be like this.
For a long time, the couple decided what to do with such a baby — he hadn't yet spoken, but already looked at the world as if he wanted to do something with it today or tomorrow. And not in a good way.
Despite Life's great love for all her creations and the same Death's great composure, they were afraid of their son and hoped that one day he would simply not respond for their call. Although, they didn't even give him a name. After all, it isn't clear what will happen to this brat next. And if he becomes a completely different being and doesn't match his name? It would be such a disgrace.
Other Horsemen who used to be just as interested in Life herself became very interested in her sonny as well. And the spouses, to the surprise of each of the Messengers, offered them a barter — Death and the Reapers get a whole year without catastrophes and other incidents, and the Horsemen can instead take the child for their vague purposes, but with the condition that the boy first needs to be raised and educated.
And the Horsemen of the Apocalypse, for some reason, refused this offer.
Yes, Life and Death turned out to be shoddy parents. But don't blame them — they knew that no one would want to live with this creature, it was worth staying with him for at least an hour, and even if at least one of the Horsemen agreed, he would soon regret it and returned the kid back with thousands of apologies. They themselves didn't want to, but the burden of parental responsibilities forced them to babysit a completely uncontrollable monster, and this despite the fact that they both still had to do their main job.
They were bad parents, you can't say anything. But they still deserved applause then and a low bow — now.
The son grew up and was full of ambitions. Neither his mother represented authority for him, nor his father. Which, for some reason, was expected. Just as it was expected that he would live for more than one century, which means that he would be just as immortal.
The boy especially liked playing cards. He grew up very gambling and eventually began to beat even the most experienced devils. And then he began to beat them in everything else, no matter what he undertook. The demons became uninterested in playing with him, and the angels in Paradise didn't want to take on God-abominable pleasures at all. In Purgatory, there was no interest for the youngster himself — it was even easier to cheat people than imps.
So the baby left, turned into a man. And he suddenly became interested in the work of the Reapers. Death was even delighted. Not for long, alas. Did he really find a successor after all? But no — the son wasn't going to distribute or collect souls. But to persuade the Reapers to all sorts of scams — you're welcome. And, most outrageous of all, the naive fools agreed to all his tricks. But what good was that to him? Was there really no purpose to all this? And he did all this just for fun?
Death didn't understand this. Life didn't understand either. They generally stopped hoping that some kind of worthwhile force would come out of their son. So far, he represented only chaos and uselessness and was not going to prove the opposite. But could such titans as Death and Life have produced something like this?
Not at all. They got something worse than simple and tasteless chaos. And much more powerful. Something corresponding to them.
The son took out two pistols, a hat, a wide-brimmed raincoat somewhere and left the Afterlife. He settled with people and forever separated the three dimensions in his native home from each other.
Now there were clear admission criteria for Heaven, Hell and Purgatory. There were an incredible number of them, Death was surprised every time by the strength and imagination of his child, but, nevertheless, he was even grateful to him, because the number of mistakes in the distribution of the deceased was reduced to a minimum, if not to zero.
The child of Life and Death turned out to be Fate itself.
Anyway, Fate didn't forget about the home and continued to go there to spite his father, once or twice a month to take away a couple of workers from him, enticing them to his service. By the way, according to the stories of the Reapers who agreed to this, it was harder or easier for someone to work for Fate, than for Death, but everyone agreed on one thing — it was more profitable and... more exctinig. With his favorite cards, Fate set completely different criteria and tasks, not letting subordinates get bored.
When the Reapers formed a trade union, Fate was once again there and ready to accept everyone who rethought their original essence and renounced their endless and inescapable work, becoming a Rebel. After all, Fate himself, in fact, was such. Over time, he was even able to purchase a ship, and now no one could escape from his though not deadly, but not at all harmless bullets.
"Fate is blind, but it strikes without a single miss" © Wlodzimierz Scislowski
That's right. Even with empty eye sockets, he never missed.
And what is it like to be in the crosshairs of Fate?..
"People are masters of their own fate" ©William Shakespeare
That's a lie. No one has ever been his master. Even, perhaps, he himself.
"Fate sells for a high price what it promises to give for free" ©Helvetias
And what did you want from, literally, a pirate?
"It's not a man who chooses fate, but fate the one who chooses a man" ©Haruki Murakami
Well, how else to recruit a crew?
"Fate is incomprehensible because it's not well-mannered at all; it enters without knocking" ©Hans Habe
No matter how hard his parents tried to wean him from this habit, they never succeeded. However, this is how they subsequently distinguished the coming of customers from the arrival of their own kid.
Life and Death have never behaved with Fate in a kindred way. Over time, in public, they even began to pretend that they were not related to him at all. But it was even better for Fate that way. Since childhood, he has been independent, the laws didn't apply to him — if all children needed parental care and affection, he only needed an audience.
It was hard to say who represented a more terrible force — he or the Horsemen. And who, in the end, was more important for the world — he or Life with Death. They haven't decided yet. And it's unlikely that they will ever decide. He got away with all his antics. And he was very good at them — after all, he was the son of Life, the Creatrix of everything. But he also got qualities from Death — he was, just like his father, relentless and inexorable to the circumstances, which, however, he had been creating himself.
A child worthy of his parents.
But not recognizing them at all.
There was no place for him anywhere in the Afterlife; he settled with people on Earth, but he didn't stay with them for a long time either. He wandered between worlds and dimensions like a restless soul. It's not for nothing that almost all Reapers of Death have heard about him, and some of them have even seen him personally. Even newcomers.
And why did he like the Reapers so much? Perhaps because they were his spiritual brothers, because Life considered them her children. Back then. But now she was very confused, not knowing whether to make them all related to her real son.
Fate has a strange path, absolutely unpredictable one. His mood is also beyond explanation. And his decisions will never be overplayed.
It's hard to imagine what Life and Death really felt like when thinking about their son. Did they regret not destroying him right away? Were they proud of his boundless power? One thing was clear for sure: they were afraid. Of their own child. But that was their Fate.
That was me, born like this. For the amusement of everyone in the Afterlife, including myself, if, of course, an indescribable boredom can be called that.