Page 5

His eyes fell to the sink, to the razor blade in it. It seemed a strange way to die, suddenly, by way of such a small thing, a tiny strip of sharpened metal. But then, he supposed it hadn’t really been the razor so much as the long, vertical gashes along his arms, which were still there, though they didn’t seem to hurt at all. In fact, he couldn’t even feel them. He seemed capable of moving them just fine, but they were completely numb.

‘Hello, again,’ came a voice, and he turned to see a figure appear next to him, sitting there... floating there. A skeleton, it seemed to be, its bones emanating white from behind a shroud of the pitchest black he had ever seen. A scythe sat in its grip, the blade hanging low beneath its body.

Hector just kind of stared, wide-eyed.

‘No return greeting, huh? Well, fine.’ The skeleton’s jaw moved with its words, though Hector couldn’t understand how.

After a moment, he managed to conjure up a word of his own. “You’re...”

‘The reaper you were just talking to, yes. Nice to meet you. Officially, that is.’

“You look... you look just like I imagined you would.” He blinked a few times. “Is this really happening...?”

‘Ah, right. My appearance.’ It gave a skeletal shrug. ‘Whatever you’re seeing, right now, it’s not really what I look like. In truth, I don’t actually look like anything.’

“...What?”

‘Your brain forms an image of what I should look like and projects it onto my presence. Appearance is something for your physical reality, where I do not exist.’

“I... don’t understand...”