“And where is it from again?” Jane asked.
“Castello di Brolio, Florence, Italia.” Leonardo replied.
Jane took another sip. “It’s delicious, Leo.”
“Do you think so? I’m afraid I must disagree. The taste is still… off.”
As it happened, RepDiv had not gotten around to making any whiskey, but what they did have was a delectable wine manifested by Leonardo himself. Jane regarded the man over her glass, unable to prevent herself from feeling a small pang of jealousy over his underworldly ability. The Italian man had adapted to his new employment far easier than she, and with the exuberance of a child experiencing the world for the first time. Of everyone in RepDiv he had approached the manifestation of memory the most creatively, the most passionately.
But what did she expect from Leonardo da Vinci?
Kay shook his head. “I was really looking forward to trying this whiskey drink that Jane so passionately swears by. When do you think you’ll get to it?”
“I will certainly do my best,” Leo said.
“How can you even drink without creating any lips?” Jane asked.
Kay shrugged, tipping his glass towards where his lips would be. Some of the wine disappeared into his form. “I’m not sure, but I’m not complaining.”
“A word of warning though, my good Kay—after our most recent council I suspect that our shop will become inundated with requests for one thing or another. We may not find the time for frivolities.”
“You don’t look that upset by it,” Jane remarked.
Leo shrugged. “Should I be?
“You’re not going to get much rest.”
“I don’t need to rest,” Leo said with a smile.
“You’re also not going to see your Heaven for some time.”
Leo laughed. “My lady, I’m already there.”
Jane raised an eyebrow. Kay manifested what could’ve been eyebrows on his otherwise featureless face and mirrored her. Leo laughed again. “What more could I want than to see my creations come to life with but a thought? To help create entire worlds? Or to see how mankind has progressed since my death! Honestly, a computer? Pierre explained the craft well enough, but such a thing can only be magic. And if not magic then certainly magical.”
Jane smiled grimly. “If only we could all be so passionate with our jobs.”
“Are you not?” Leo said with surprise.
Jane shrugged, leaning back against the plush sofa that Leo kept in his office. “I didn’t ask to be the underworld’s project manager.”
“Yet you were the first of us that Master Death approached,” Leo said. “That says much about your capabilities.”
“No, I wasn’t. I was just the first one to say yes.”
“That says even more!”
Jane shrugged but didn’t reply, taking another sip of wine.
Leo watched her for several moments before placing his glass on the coffee table next to his armchair and crossing his legs. “Would you tell me of your life, Lady Jane?”
Jane snorted. “Excuse me?”
“Please. I have been so preoccupied with my creations that I only now realize how starved I’ve been of idle conversation. I know almost nothing of my colleagues other than Pierre, and who better to learn more of than our wonderful leader?”
Jane grimaced internally. “If it’s the leader you want then I’ll summon Death for you.”
Leo gave a small smile and shook his head. “Mistress Death is to be respected. Always. But they do not understand the humans who’s ends they govern. How could they when they have never been one of us?”
Jane pounced upon the chance to steer the conversation. “Mistress Death? You just called them Master.”
“When I was alive the poets painted Death as powerful and indifferent as a man at war, or as soft and beguiling as a woman’s kiss. Now that I find that they aren’t simply one or the other I’ve decided to treat them as both. But let us put Death aside for now and discuss life instead.”
Leo beamed encouragingly while Kay leaned forward in his chair, clearly just as interested. Jane cursed inwardly, taking another sip of wine to stall for time. “What’s there to discuss? My life wasn’t interesting. I lived. I succeeded, I failed, I died. There’s nothing more to say.”
Kay harumphed. Leo had the courtesy to maintain his smile. “How did you fill your time when you were not acting as the head of your merchantry?”
“Metal concerts. Stardew Valley. Planning work for the next day.”
“What is a metal concert?” Leo’s brow furrowed at the unfamiliar terms.
“Kay, remind me to request headphones for all senior staff.”
Leo frowned slightly, looking between the two. “Perhaps we should begin with more general questions—ones that don’t require explanation of how the world has changed. Where did you live?”
“America.”
“Ah, yes, a country of the new world. And discovered so shortly after my death… relatively speaking. To think, all that was found there. What was the name of your hometown?”
“Seattle.”
“And you liked it there?”
“Mostly. It rained a lot, but the coffee was good.”
“How long did you live there?”
“My whole life.”
“At what age did you pass?”
Jane sighed. Leonardo and his questions. “46.”
The nice thing about the unlife was the ability to exist in whichever form a soul wanted. Jane’s body from her mid-twenties, thankfully, had been easy for her to manifest, if nothing else. She supposed that some part of her had never stopped seeing herself that way.
“46 is not a bad number at all. Many are lucky to see such an age. I was surely blessed to have made it as far as I did,” Leo said.
Jane drank more wine.
“Master Kay, please, join the conversation. How old were you when you passed?”
Kay tilted his head in thought, but gave up after a moment with a shrug of his shoulders. “I still have no idea, I’m afraid. But I get the sense that it was long. Very long.”
“Trying to boast, my friend?”
Kay shrugged again.
“Why do you simply not ask Master Death for the answer?”
“I don’t want to know it.”
Both Leo and Jane paused to look at him. “And why is that?” Leo asked.
Jane had been wondering about this herself. Now it was her turn to lean in. Kay tapped the stem of his glass, rhythmically counting the seconds away until he spoke again. “I was in purgatory for a very long time. Just… standing around, waiting for something. No thoughts, no wants, only eternity. There wasn’t any pleasure—no red wine to enjoy amongst friends—but neither was there pain.”
Kay swished the wine around for a moment. “What if I don’t like who I was? What if I was a bastard? What if I’m deserving of torture and I don’t yet know it? And think about what Death told us just now about the different realms. I might not have even been human, I might’ve been a thought. A nasty, monstrous thought whose maker immediately condemned it to burn moments after giving birth to it. What if evil is in my very nature?”
The room fell silent. Jane stared at Kay with an open mouth. Even Leo’s normally unfettered countenance became troubled. “Kay,” she finally said, “I had no idea.”
Kay shrugged.
“Why are you saying this now?”
“I’m not sure. The wine, maybe?” At Jane’s raised eyebrow he sighed and added, “it took me a while to fully understand how I felt myself. When I did, I was struck by something—something Death said, about how eternity makes things seem to matter less. Until I’m able to work up the spine to ask them about my identity I’ll be stuck in Purgatory. Stuck in eternity, like the moment between two breaths, where things matter less. Things like who I used to be.
“I think I just want you to be aware, ma’am.” He nodded at Jane. “You have a light at the end of the tunnel, and I’ll be damned if I drag you down with this weight on my shoulders. Who I used to be doesn't matter for the task at hand, but who I am now does. Its enough being your assistant, having purpose again as Kay the Aide. Even if you do ask me for coffee a little too much.”
Jane was so taken by surprise at the levity in that last comment compared to the rest of his monologue that she barked out a laugh. Kay chuckled along with her. “I think that Death knows this already,” he said. “They have this odd aura about them, like a grandparent knowing that their grandchild is struggling and patiently waiting for them to ask for help. You know what I mean?”
“Yeah, that’s how I felt teaching them how to work a computer.” Jane laughed.
“And when you taught me too, no doubt,” Leo chuckled.
Jane fell silent as Leo and Kay launched into an enthusiastic discussion about computers again, watching Kay somberly. It was a brave thing he’d just done. Brave and honorable. He could’ve kept everything to himself, but he’d chosen to share a piece of his feelings with her for the sake of their shared mission—to give Jane a chance to respond swiftly if he changed in any way.
Brave. Honorable… naïve.
Being a project manager had taught her more than just precision. If Kay had known better, he would’ve said nothing.
She put such thoughts away, refilled her glass, and tried her best to be interested in Leo’s excited description of what a ‘circuit board’ was.
ns 15.158.61.17da2
