Grim

Chapter 13 - Bargaining with a Demon

"Wait!" I stop myself, pausing for a moment to think. "I suppose you would want my soul in return demon?"

The demon looks away from me and yawns. "Of course I would love to receive that present, but please do make sure to wrap it with a bow on top."

"Sacasm may confound the angels, but I am quite familiar with it demon."

Ornias smiles again. "One more reason the angels are so out of touch with things. They like to think they know everything, but they don't see the shades of grey in everything. They see everything as black and white, but we all have our dark side. Even I have a goodness in me that I can't quite seem to stamp out no matter how hard I try."

It's my turn to yawn. "I didn't know we were going to talk philosophy. At least it wasn't on the schedule when I last checked."

"Ah yes. It comes back to the lists. What I'm saying is that out of the goodness in my heart I can offer you the names on the lists. I had access to both lists, and yes I admit that I may have tampered with one or both of them."

I can feel the flames in my eyes dance a bit. "You bastard!"

He ignores me and continues, "I can assure you that it was quite on accident.. OK I lie. It was mostly on purpose, but this job can be so boring. You can't blame a demon for trying to spice things up. With that said, I feel bad for deceiving you Thomas. I was only trying to annoy Remiel. He takes everything so seriously! As an apology I will provide you with the remaining list of names, and I only ask of you one small favor. Really it's more for your benefit, but I want to watch. Of course if you want to give me your soul, I would jump at that deal. That would require you to leave your girm-reaper shell though, and then you wouldn' t be able to help those souls on the list. Kinda defeats the purpose doesn't it?"

I'm not sure what the demon is getting at, and I'm almost afraid to ask. "What favor?"

The demon pulls out a prepared sheet of paper with writing on it. Demons love their contracts. "Nothing to worry about. I just want to be there to see you practice your new abilities as they manifest." He signs the contract in front of me using a quill that he first jabs into his arm. Why do all demon contracts have to be signed in blood?

I inspect the contract, and everything appears to be in order. Still I don't trust Ornias. I scratch into the contract with my finger, "Any fine print or other agreement written in a way not visible by grim-reapers will cause this contract to be null and void." I hand it back saying "Agree to that line and we have a deal."

The demon looks it over smiling. "You don't trust me?! I'm hurt." He stabs the quill into his arm once again and initials the new line.

He hands the contract back to me, and I scrape my signature onto the contract using my finger once again. To finalize the deal I have to give up a part of myself. A reaper doesn't have blood to sign the contract with. They only have bones. I detach the last segment of my left pinkie finger, and punch it halfway through the contract.

Ornias says, "Excellent!" He snatches the contract from me. "Here's your list." He hands me another sheet of paper that he seems to manifest out of nowhere.

The names and times are here, but this isn't the same as what I'm used to. It's one list and it doesn't tell me where to send the souls. "Ornias! This list is incomplete!"

The demon smiles at me while tucking the contract inside his suit jacket. "I only promised to give you the list of names. Out of the goodness in my heart I provided the time of death for each as well. I'm afraid that giving two favors is beyond what I am capable of. My shade of grey is a bit on the dark side I'm afraid. You might want to hurry. The next name on the list died about fifteen minutes ago." With that, he teleports away with a bit of the demon's laughter hanging on the wind.