Karma Box Set (Karma 0.5-4)
Donna Augustine
Chapter One
People say karma's a bitch.
Personally, I really don't think I'm that bad, as long as you haven't done anything wrong that is. Seriously, it's not like I asked for this job. I wasn't even in my right mind when I agreed to the position. I thought it would mean I could stay on Earth. I did, just not how I'd hoped.
Like all contracts, it's the fine print that screws you, not the big fat text that offers you all the good stuff. As a lawyer, I'd spent years warning people about the fine print and now look at me. Stuck.
If I could just go back to that day, the moment when I made my first mistake and agreed. Unfortunately, of all the things I can do, time travel isn't one of them.
After I'm done here and my trial period has run its course, I'll go back into the system and get reborn. They say I won't have any memory of this, but I can't imagine forgetting the day I died.
I couldn't look away from my body, lying lifeless and dirty, blonde hair fanned out around the face. My face. I wasn't moving, not even a smidgen.
In contrast, the chest of the body I was in felt like a broken accordion with a leak, flailing to get enough air in.
I fought through the fog, which clung to my thoughts, trying to piece the scene together from fragmented memories. I'd wanted a couple of days alone after my fight with Charlie, my fiancé, so I decided to visit a friend from law school who lived in Virginia. The last thing I remembered was looking out the window at the expanse of forest rolling by as the train sped along. We'd crossed into South Carolina a while ago and I knew I'd be home within the hour.
No, there was something else I remembered. A screeching sound, right before I flew from my seat, and then the sounds of screams around me. And not just raised voices, but the kind that are formed only from pure terror. They don't sound human, and there isn't an actor or actress alive who could fake them. These are the type, if you're unlucky enough, you only hear in real life and in situations that are usually deadly. It's the kind of sound that leaves a permanent bookmark in your mind.
I looked down at my hands, the ones that belonged to the body I occupied, not the mangled ones on the ground, covered in a mixture of dirt and blood. They looked solid enough but somehow different, and there was my body on the grass, my blue dress torn and shredded, my pink polished fingernails, chipped and ragged. I knelt down and pushed the few strands of hair away from my...its eyes. My black shoe lay about ten feet away. I must have lost it during the fall.
I looked down at my feet. Where did these tan sandals come from? And these pants? These weren't my things. Nothing was right. Maybe that wasn't my body?
I moved my fingers to its chin and turned it toward me, revealing my full face, then yanked back quickly. I stumbled in my effort to put some distance between us, even though I couldn't seem to look away.
I heard sirens in the distance, a lot of them, all combining to form the sound of dread. One siren could be anything. This many always meant something bad.
But I'd already known that.
I forced myself to look up and take in the scene. I'd been thrown thirty or so feet from the wreck. The streamlined train now resembled a shape closer to a discarded straw wrapper. There were more bodies laid out around its perimeter and a few people, dazed and limping around, not far from the wreck.
“Hello?” I screamed but no one turned toward me. Maybe they were in shock?
“They can't hear you.”
I was startled by the nasally male voice coming from right beside me. I heard him clear his throat before he spoke again.
“Your human body is dead, Camilla. We don't have much time and there are decisions to be made.” His pen tapped, tapped, tapped on the clip board he was holding and I clenched my hands to stop myself from ripping the makeshift drum from his fidgeting hands so I could think clearly. I felt agitated and raw.
“Am I having a psychotic break from reality?” I asked as I turned to look at him. He was small of stature and wore Coke-bottle black framed glasses. He looked down at his digital watch and then back at me, with barely restrained impatience. I knew the expression well; I was usually the one wearing it.
“I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to give you the short version. You seem to be routed for express, so there simply isn't enough time to get into all the nitty gritty contract details—”
“I'm dead?”
“That body is, yes. You can choose to move on or—”
“Move on?” What was this strange little man speaking of? He was as odd as the situation, with bright red hair jutting this way and that from untamed cowlicks.
Maybe I was already in the hospital and under heavy medication.
“Yes, heaven, hell, perhaps somewhere in between. It isn't my department so I'm not privy to those details, or what happens after this point, just that there is something. So, you can stay on here or move on.”
I reached out a hand and grabbed his arm. Solid. He looked down at where I touched him with unconcealed distaste at the contact but didn't comment. I didn't let go, just squeezed tighter. He felt like he was really here.
“Who are you? Are you an angel or something?” Maybe I was really dead. This isn't what I'd expected though. Where were the bright lights and people to welcome me? And his delivery needed some work.
“I told you, I have nothing to do with that. I'm not an angel. I'm Harold.”
“If you aren't an angel, what are you?”
“I run the agency Unknown Forces of the Universe.”
“And why would I want to remain here, as a ghost, working for you, whatever it is you are?” This was too bizarre to be real. No pearly gates or Grandma and Grandpa welcoming me, just a strange little red haired man? I had to be lying in a coma somewhere, drugged to the gills. I was hoping I was, because if this was death, a lot of people, including me, were going to be seriously disappointed.
He clucked his tongue as if having to explain all this was a bother. “No, not as a ghost. With a normal body. Why? Because I'm going to offer you a chance to make this world a better place. To fix the wrongs of the universe. This is quite a huge opportunity. I only recruit once or twice a decade and I can't remember the last time a human got the opportunity.”
“I don't like this dream. This is why I didn't take the pain pills when I got hurt last summer. They gave me the worst nightmares ever.”
“This is not a dream.”
“How do I know that?” I probably shouldn't argue with him, but it was my nature. This was a dream. I should just change it. Couldn't I do that? If I was making this up, I was in control.
“Look at that.” He motioned to my body like I hadn't noticed it or been staring already. “That is your dead human form.”
“No, that's just a double of me made up by my mind.” It had to be.
“Do you remember the pain?”
I shuddered as I thought of it. When the train screeched to a halt and I went flying through the air, right before everything went black, there had been a moment of pure agony, the kind that made you forget your name, your life, just made you wish for death, nothingness.
“If it was a dream, you would have woken. The human mind can't handle the idea of its own death, even in a dream. Do you understand me? You would've woken. Technically, you are dead. At least your mortal frame is.”
He was right. If I were dreaming, I should've woken. I couldn't escape the logic.
I was dead.
I dropped to the ground, losing the strength in my new legs.
Dead?
“Now, will you work for me?”