“Blah” is Speaking.
‘Blah’ is thinking.
“Tech Beat, for your crimes against ponies everywhere, you are being sentenced to eternal unrest!” The ghostly form shouted out with authority. Some of the spirits in the background gasped at this proclamation. Whispers broke out among them.
Tech Beat huffed. “Pssh. I’m guessing that means I’m going to be a ghost? I could do that. Give me plenty of time to get some revenge.”
The judge of the dead gave his best “i-am-unhappy-and-you-are-going-to-regret-ever- being-a-smartass-with-me” look.
“That is not the point of eternal unrest. It was meant to be a punishment. You will never see anyone you love again. You will never know piece. Ponies will be afraid of you for the simple fact that you are a ghost.”
Tech shrugged. “So? Fear is power. I’ve never loved anyone, as my parents abandoned me. I worked my way up on the world! Me! And then some snot nosed... human comes and upsirps me and my power!” He yelled, sneering as he said the word ‘human’.
“So, you see this as not a punishment, but as a reward for what you did in life?” Boomed the judge, and edge to his voice.
Tech didn’t catch it, and continued on in his rant. “No. I see it as a way to finish several rather... unsavory things I should’ve done with my life.”
“Oh really?”
Tech glared at the judge, fire in his eyes. “Yes.”
The judge glared back, causing Tech to shrink back. Tech had stared down some worthy opponents in his days alive, but was something about this one contest that he couldn’t compete with.
“Fine then. I have something different mind for you. We haven’t done it in a while, as quite frankly it always causes quite a stir ‘up top’ if you know what I mean.” The judge said. Tech began to worry about his current situation, as the judge almost sounded... happy.
He put up a steely facade. He had learned ago that it was never a good idea to show the other side your intimidation. You wanted to be intimidating, not be intimidated.
“You know, I really don’t have any ideas of what the hell you are talking about. So why don’t you enlighten me.” Tech said, putting all of his available sarcasm into those few words.
The limited audience in the background gasped. It had been forever since the had seen anyone with the audacity to speak to the head judge in such a way.
“Oh. You’re going back up to the world of the living alright... You’ll just be carrying a little extra weight.”
Tech groaned. “Please tell me that isn’t a really lame way to say you’re going to make me carry chains for the rest of eternity.”
The judge fumed silently for a moment. “No. You will see when you get what’s coming to you!” He flipped some papers behind his little podium a grinned. “Oh, this is going to be so much better than anticipated. It says cause of death is a stake through the throat? By your own magic? Oh, the karma.”
Tech’s facade dropped, albeit unwillingly. “Wait, what?”
“No more talking! This session is over. We’ll see what you think of your punishment when you get back here. Perhaps you’ll even make it in one piece. Tech Beat, in order for you to escape this eternal punishment, you must earn the forgiveness of the one whose love you broke up for your own petty reasons. ”
The unicorn opened his mouth to argue, but was cut off by the judge snapping his fingers. Everything went black, and Tech was no more in the land of the dead. But he didn’t quite belong in the land of the living either.
//0(db)0\
Tech woke up in the dark, cold place. The hum of an air conditioner resonated in the background. Eyes jerking around, he tried to move. His head jerked up, and he felt it brush against fabric.
“Okay then.” He said. Or, well, tried to say. It came out more like “rah reh”. Something was wrong with his vocal cords. He tried to remember what happened last night.
Movement. Tech wasn’t quite sure what he was on, but he was sure moving somewhere. The squeaking of the wheels was a welcome change from the constant humming of the AC. What he couldn’t understand is how he was still alive. He had died, hadn’t he? Stabbed himself in throat for revenge.
A voice from outside the cover. Tech had tried to escape, but it was zipped from the outside, and he couldn’t manage to even get a small sliver of light to shine through.
“Case Number four thousand, alpha A8-9Z. Subject name: Tech Beat. Cause of death: Stabbed in the throat, drowned in his own blood. Possible collapsed throat.”
‘What!?’
What indeed. He wasn’t dead! He was living, thinking, and breathing!
Wasn’t he? He was thinking. Check. But as for the other two, he wasn’t sure.
He should be dead, but he wasn’t. Maybe...
He knew it was true.
He didn’t want it to be true.
His mind had denied the court visit as a dream. One that Tech had managed to convince himself that it was just a side effect of almost dieing.
“Rehg.” That meant, loosely translated, ‘Dammit.’
‘If I’m not alive, and I’m stuck in my body... I’m not a ghost...’
‘I’m a zombie!’
The technician shuffled some papers around and continued. “Date is-”
Tech gasped. It was only a week after his... revenge. Why the hell was he only getting looked at now? He was important! This little thing only confirmed his belief that he was right in his revenge.
Silence. The technician had stopped talking. It was quiet for about a minute before Tech heard the fumbling of the zipper and the bag unzipped. He quickly tried to play dead before giving up the act. The face of the pegasus staring at him with horror in his eyes told him that he wasn’t fooling anyone.
Tech weakly waved a hoof towards the technician.
“Herhg” (Hello). The unicorn in the body bag said, er... tried to say. He hadn’t planned on being alive... well, using his body after mangling his own voice box.
The technician stared at Tech for a moment before letting out an estranged squeaking sound. With a crash, the pegasus fainted, bumping into the table that held the tools for an autopsy. Clinks and clangs of metal knives and scalpels hitting the sterile floor.
“Hey ‘Scission. You okay in there?”
Tech could hear someone coming closer to the room. Looking around, he could only see two exits. One a conventional way, via the door, the other via a less comfortable way out the window. Hopping out of the body bag, he moved towards the door, trying to get out before the unknown co-worker of the currently fainted pegasus on the floor got there.
Something was wrong with his legs. He could move them, but they were stiff. Just getting off the table top was a challenge for him. It gave him the lumbering impression of a bad actor trying to portray a zombie. Which in all thought, he probably was.
He went to the door as quickly as possible, but it still wasn’t fast enough.
“ ‘Scission? What’s going on in there? Dude. Seriously! April Fools was like a month ago. I swear to god that if you’re pulling a prank on me, I’m going to-”
The rest of his rant was lost on Tech, who was panicking. He never panicked, and here he was, doing just that. And panicking tends to do hell on the choices that one makes. Tech Decided to hide under the table.
Well. Tried to. He sorta failed on actually getting his entire body underneath the table.
But, you know. Panic.
The door swung open mid-rant.
“-and if you think that this is some way to get me back for that prank last week, you are- Oh. Oh shit! ‘Scission! What the hell happened to you?”
A mild sound of frantic hoof steps came to Tech’s ears. Then silence.
“What the hell? This has gone too far ‘Scission. “I admit, you had me going, but then you go and position and dead body? That’s... just gross.”
‘Shit.’
Backing up, Tech made a run for the door, passed the stunned unicorn, who had definitely had not expected the body that had been dead for at least a week to get up and run for freedom.
“Zombies?” He stuttered, incredulously.
And then he gave up the ghost and fainted, landing next to his colleague in the floor.
