DIS: Glitch in the System: Kril's Anomaly

DIS: Glitch in the System: Kril's Anomaly

As the judge Aeacus read through my death certificate, I actually noticed certain things about him for the first time. He and the two men to either side of him were extremely tall, and their desks reached just up to their elbows. These towering wooden podiums, behind which the judges stood, made me feel extremely small. The judges all wore traditional black robes, but they had each decorated their own with bright, colorful stamps and pins, mostly exclaiming something about which nations' men they were in charge of judging. They didn't wear those grey-haired wigs with the rolls on the side; instead, they sported various strange hairstyles. Aeacus' was by far the strangest of the three; his short brown hair was all spiked outward, save for a wide strip in the middle, which had been smoothed back and curled forward like a crescent moon. By the time I had gotten around to staring impolitely at his strange haircut, Aeacus was talking to himself about what he was reading about me.

"Well, now," the judge Aeacus mused, pondering over one particular page, "this is quite interesting...Are you sure you're supposed to be here, mister...Krilangi...?"

"Well, I'm dead, aren't I," I replied sarcastically. "Why else would I be here?"

"Well, I only ask because...there are blank pages at the end of this death certificate..."

"What does that mean?"

"Well, it basically mean that...you died well before your time was meant to come. In short...you weren't supposed to die when you did."

"That's...Well, I guess that makes sense...I think...Perhaps you should explain it to me..."

"Because you died before your time was up, the underworld hasn't been prepared for your entry...This kind of thing only happens once every...oh, 50 millenia, give or take a few days, and it always means a mountain of paperwork for everyone, including Hades..."

"Who is Hades?"

"You don't know who Hades is," Aeacus cried, obviously taken aback. "Why, Hades is your lord and master, now that you're dead! He's the lord of the underworld and all the souls in it!"

Now I was truly confounded; I was dead before I was supposed to die, I was sent to the underworld without my memory, and now I had no place as a dead spirit. At that moment, though, one thing stood out in my mind, and I had to ask another question.

"So, what happens to me now?"

"That's up to Hades' younger brother, Zeus. He's god over all things, and his home turf is a kickin' joint at the peak of the holy mountain, Olympus. Depending on what he says, we'll either have to stretch the boundaries to make room, or we'll just have to send you back to the living world. Either way, it'll be such a pain for us...and I'd hate to be the demi-god who needs to tell Hades about this..."

"Wait...so I have another chance at life...?!"

"Don't get your hopes up...but, as thin as this chance is, it's still a chance. Then again...if Zeus sees your death certificate, he might just be willing to let you back on the mortal coil."

"Why would he change his mind because of that?"

"Well, seeing as you were so important to so many people in your lifetime, he might give you a break, if only to save Hades the stress of having to deal with them all at once..."

"Wait, I...What...?! Important...to...?!"

At the moment that I really took in those words, I felt a pain in my head so vicious and sudden that I thought someone had split me in two. As memories from my life rushed into my mind at blinding speeds, I let out a wild scream in my anguish, and I heard it echo back to me from the darkest recesses of the underworld just before I blacked out.

...As my echoing shriek rebounded off the cavern walls, Hades, who had been dozing off at his desk, suddenly straightened up and snapped to full attention. Hearing my horrible cry, he got a dread feeling that something big was about to go down on his home field. And he couldn't have been more right.