Fic: All Our Times Have Come
Jul. 29th, 2019 07:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ellerkayTitle: All Our Times Have Come
Genre: Gen, humor, philosophy (kind of)
Characters: Billie, Death, God, the Empty, tiny appearance by a Reaper OMC
Rating: Teen/PG-13
Word Count: 3500
Disclaimer: All for fun, none for profit.
Summary: As Billie sleeps in the Empty, she dreams about her life, her relationship with Death, and her general irritation with the Winchesters.
A/N: Written for the Swan Song Bingo, Billie!Death square (season 13). Takes place in early S13ish but with a lot of flashbacks. Title taken from Blue Oyster Cult's "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" because I had to. I'm so excited to finally be sharing this one, my friends!
Read on AO3
***
January 2017
Dying, Billie reflects as Castiel’s blade pierces her heart, hurts. She’s been ferrying souls for countless millennia, but she’s never known what it was like. She’s starting to understand why people get so upset about it.
The angels and demons in the Empty do not dream. They do not think or remember. Their sleep is nothingness. But Billie is not like them. She is becoming something more than she was.
Billie dreams. Billie remembers.
A very long time ago
Billie looked around. All was light, nearly formless. She was surrounded by her fellows. Reapers; she knew that much. She had come into being to serve Death, but she had only so much of an idea of what that meant.
“I made you these!” said a voice, though both ‘said’ and ‘voice’ didn’t really apply, and the words were thought, not language. In any case, communication was occurring and Billie could comprehend it. It came from a blindingly bright presence in front of Billie. The light seemed to be addressing a dark shape next to it.
“Why?” asked the shape, sounding wryly amused. “Don’t you have enough angels?”
“No, no, these are special angels, for you! You’re going to have a lot more to do soon, with all the things I’m going to be making. I figured you might want to, y’know, delegate.”
The dark shape seemed to regard the Reapers. “I don’t need them.”
“No, look, it’ll be great! Just take a gander at one.” Billie felt herself move without volition, drawing nearer to the light and the dark shape. “I call this one Billie. She could be, I don’t know, your assistant or something.”
“She?”
“Yeah, I’m trying out this thing called gender. It’s kind of weird and experimental, but really interesting. I get a female vibe from this Reaper, I think.”
The dark shape said nothing.
“Come on!” the light said, after a moment. “Don’t you like them?”
“I’ll take them,” the dark shape replied. “But you know I don’t accept bribes. Even you can die.”
May 2007
Billie dropped the day’s files on Death’s mahogany desk. As always, the reading room was lit using gas lamps with bright brass fixtures. The polished dark wood floor and darker wood bookshelves gleamed in the light. A cheerful fire blazed in the marble fireplace behind Death’s desk.
“Today’s notable deaths,” Billie announced.
Death nodded his thanks and reached out with his long, thin fingers to take the top file. “Anything interesting?”
“Not that one,” Billie said as Death opened it. “Kid was stabbed in the back. Demons were involved somehow, but it was another human that killed him. I’m not sure why it was flagged.”
“Sam Winchester,” Death read. He tapped the page. “Ah. Of the Winchester Gospels.”
“There are no Winchester gospels,” Billie said.
“No,” Death agreed. “Not yet.” He glanced up at her. “Haven’t you read the Supernatural books?”
“I’ve never even heard of them.”
“Not surprising. They’re not very popular, and wildly inconsistent.” Death sighed. “Their author doesn’t take constructive criticism very well.”
Death said this kind of thing sometimes. Mysterious pronouncements that made no sense. Billie had learned when he was likely to tell her more, and she didn’t think this was one of those times.
“Let me know if you need me for anything,” she said, assuming the conversation was at an end. She turned away.
“Billie.”
She turned back.
“I don’t expect that Sam Winchester will be dead for very long.”
She frowned. “What makes you say that?”
“Call it a hunch,” he replied. “I suggest you read the Supernatural series. They may shed some light on the situation.”
They didn’t. Billie breezed through them all that afternoon. Most were fine. Not really her taste. She threw Route 666 at a wall when she was done with it. But In My Time of Dying caught her attention.
It wasn’t long until she got word that Sam Winchester was back from the dead. His brother had made a demon deal. She brought the news to Death.
“You knew it would happen,” she said to him.
He shrugged. “I’m not surprised,” he replied. “What about you?”
“Not after reading the books. Of course the brother sacrificed himself.” She shook her head. “I don’t like it. They’ve both cheated death. Dean should have died after his heart attack or when Tessa came for him. These Winchesters don’t care about the rules. They’re going to be trouble.”
Death regarded her with his dark, fathomless eyes. “I suppose we’ll see.”
February 2008
A Reaper who looked like a young blond man approached Billie’s desk.
“Yes?” she said, looking up from her paperwork.
He held out a thick file, fingers trembling slightly. “I think you should take a look at this.”
Frowning, Billie accepted the file and opened it. Her eyes widened as she paged through the sheets. She looked up at the Reaper.
“You didn’t think to bring this up after twenty or thirty, Kevin?” she asked.
He shrugged helplessly, eyes wide. “We didn’t notice! I don’t know why. The reports were being generated, they were in plain view, we just – we didn’t see them!”
Billie slammed the folder shut, shot a glare at Kevin, and stalked off. When she reached Death’s desk, she brandished the folder at him.
“Dean Winchester has died eighty-seven times today,” she said.
Death raised an eyebrow. “That does seem a little above average.” He took the file and glanced through it.
“I told you the Winchesters were going to be trouble,” Billie said.
Death was smiling slightly as he perused a sheet. “Tacos,” he said, sotto voce. “I haven’t had a taco in decades.”
“How is this happening?” Billie demanded.
“The being responsible for this is more trouble than he’s worth,” Death said. “Stay out of it.”
“But whoever he is, he’s flouting the laws of death!” Billie exclaimed. “Not to mention time. He’s warping reality.”
“I’m aware. Let’s see how this plays out.”
At long last, the reports stopped coming in. Dean Winchester had been shot in a parking lot. This time, he was gone for good. Billie breathed a sigh of relief and went back to work.
For months, things were quiet. Business as usual. And then…
There was something very familiar about this day, Billie thought as she looked through the reports on her desk.
“Something’s going on,” she said to Death as she delivered the day’s files. “I’m having déjà vu.”
“Yes?”
“Reapers don’t get déjà vu.”
A trace of a smile passed across Death’s face. “Interesting,” he said, steepling his fingers and looking at her. “Do you remember Dean Winchester?”
“That punk hunter who should have been dead at least twice over? Sure.”
“Do you remember the day he wouldn’t stop dying?”
Billie frowned and started to say no, of course she didn’t; how would that even be possible? But something niggled in the back of her head; a flash of memory.
“Sort of,” she said slowly.
“Very interesting,” Death said. “You shouldn’t be able to at all. I’m one of less than a dozen beings who are capable of remembering.”
“Remembering what, exactly?”
“Time has folded in upon itself. It went on after that day, and now it’s back again.” Death shrugged. “Gabriel does like his little jokes.”
“The archangel Gabriel?!”
Death only smiled.
Billie glared at him. “You think it’s funny,” she accused him.
Death’s smile didn’t waver. “Gabriel has his moments.”
May 2008
Dean Winchester was dead; ripped apart by hellhounds and dragged downstairs. Billie hoped that this time, he was gone for good. But something told her they hadn’t seen the last of him.
September 2008
“Dean Winchester,” Billie said, “is like a cockroach.”
Death had invited her to have dinner with him. About six months ago, he’d started doing that sometimes. Billie liked it. She liked her boss, even though he could be infuriating.
“More like a cat, wouldn’t you say?” Death replied. They were strolling through a carnival. His idea of dinner was a deep-fried candy bar. Billie had gotten funnel cake. It wasn’t bad.
“Whatever he’s like,” Billie said, “it’s extremely annoying.”
“I think it’s funny,” Death said.
Billie rolled her eyes. “I know you do.” Death hadn’t giggled, exactly, when Billie had told him earlier that day. Death didn’t giggle. Billie would have been prepared to agree that it has been a quiet chortle, though.
“You’d better get used to it,” Death said. “I doubt he or his brother are going to stop anytime soon.”
“Shouldn’t we do something about it?”
“I’m not particularly inclined to,” Death said. “It’s amusing. And they’re part of a larger plan.”
“What plan? Yours?”
“You know perfectly well that I don’t plan.”
Billie pursed her lips. “God’s.”
Death gave an elegant shrug. “In any case, as long as I’m in charge, we aren’t going to interfere.”
Billie laughed. Death raised an eyebrow at her.
“You make it sound like there’s a time when you won’t be in charge,” she said. The idea was ridiculous.
Death took another bite of his candy bar before replying. “Even I can die,” he said. “Nothing in this universe, or any universe, is exempt.”
“Do you…think you’re going to?” Billie asked uncertainly. She didn’t think he could see the future, but he had a knack for predicting it. He knew so much.
“The possibility has crossed my mind,” Death said.
“Why?”
Death stopped walking and looked at her. Billie stopped, too.
“When things happen to cosmic entities,” Death said slowly, “there can be reverberations. Ripples, if you will, forward and backward in time.”
“And you’ve seen signs of this?”
“Possibly.”
Billie frowned. “What happens if you die? Will there be a new Death?”
Death was silent for a long moment. “Perhaps one day you’ll find out,” he said finally.
2008-2009
Billie was starting to get numb to it.
She rolled her eyes when she saw Sam Winchester’s name on a report. Killed by a lightning strike; back almost immediately when the wish was reversed.
Awhile later, a report dated 2014 mysteriously turned up on Billie’s desk. Dean had been killed by Lucifer. She checked the records, but Dean Winchester was alive. Billie brought it to Death, who told her not to worry about it and just file it under “Futures – Avoided,” which was not a category Billie had been aware of previously. She shook her head and did as she was told.
Then it was the younger one’s turn again. A report from the 1970s appeared, detailing Sam’s murder by Anna and resurrection by Michael. Billie quickly returned it to Sam’s increasingly thick file.
It was shortly after this that Billie was in New York with Death at a late-night French fry restaurant. They were chatting as usual when Death abruptly stopped talking.
“What’s wrong?” Billie asked.
Death’s lip curled in annoyance as he lifted his hands up. Billie could see something pale and silvery binding his wrists.
“What the hell is that?” she demanded.
“Appropriate phrasing,” Death replied drily. “It’s a spell. Lucifer.”
“That little pissant – ” Billie started indignantly.
“Yes,” Death interrupted. “He is.” He winced. “I have to go. He’s calling. Look after things while I’m gone.”
He vanished. Billie pursed her lips and returned to the reading room to gather the other Reapers and let them know what had happened.
It wasn’t difficult to run things in Death’s absence. There was a lot of work to do, but the Reapers kept themselves out of the Heaven/Hell showdown. Billie didn’t mind handing things back over to Death once he returned. He was in charge; those were the rules. Not a big deal.
“I met one of the Winchesters,” Death told her.
“Oh?”
“Yes. Dean.”
Billie tried to remember which of them that was.
“The elder brother,” Death clarified at her look.
Billie rolled her eyes. “He’s even worse than the other one.”
Death smiled ever so slightly. “I found him rather entertaining.”
“I’m sure you did,” Billie grumbled. “Well, Sam’s in the Cage now, and from what I hear, Dean has settled down to a normal life. Maybe we’ve finally seen the last of them.”
Death’s smile deepened a hair. “I’ve missed your optimism.”
December 2010
“You can’t be serious,” Billie said, as Death pulled on his coat. “You can’t go to him!”
“Can’t I?” Death asked calmly.
“Dean Winchester gets his heart stopped and summons Tessa and demands to talk with you and you’re just going to hop to when he says?!”
Death gave her a long, level look. “Of course not,” he said. “But I’ve been meaning to speak with him anyway.” And he was gone.
Billie hmmphed and went about reaping souls with a decidedly poor attitude.
Her appointments that day happened to be spaced close together and she was soon back in the reading room. Death was watching Dean Winchester in a scrying mirror. He asked Billie to join him.
“You gave him your ring?” Billie said, incredulous.
“I did. Just for the day.”
She shook her head, giving up entirely on trying to understand the way Death’s mind worked. When Dean refused to take the little girl, though, she didn’t bother to suppress an irritated noise.
“He hasn’t learned anything,” she said.
“No. But perhaps today he will.”
Later, Death declared that he was going to talk to Dean. He picked up an old-fashioned valise.
“You’re going to give him his brother’s soul back,” Billie said. “Even though he lost the wager.”
“The point,” Death said, “was not for him to win. It was for him to learn.” He nodded towards the scrying mirror. “You can watch our conversation, if you like.”
“You indulge them,” Billie said. “The Winchesters.”
Death gave a small shrug. “They grow on one,” he said, and disappeared.
September 2011
“Still fond of them?” Billie asked. She’d seen the Winchesters’ attempt to bind Death. He let her use his scrying mirror whenever she wanted. She did so only sparingly, but when he had disappeared unexpectedly, she’d judged it an appropriate time.
“A little less at the moment,” Death admitted. “But I have to admire their – what’s that wonderful word? – chutzpah. And that angel calling itself God needed to be taken down a peg.”
Billie nodded, but said nothing. She had the strangest sense of foreboding, but she couldn’t find any rational explanation for it. She decided it wasn’t worth mentioning.
May 2015
“Again? Really?” Billie said.
“He made taquitos,” Death replied. “It would be rude not to at least try them.”
“After he went all the way up to the edge and then refused to go with you last time you saw him?”
“That was the other one,” Death said patiently. “Sam. This is Dean. Regardless, I’m going.”
Billie’s hand shot out seemingly of its own volition and grabbed Death’s arm. He looked at her with a raised eyebrow. She didn’t release him.
“I don’t think you should go,” she said, not breaking eye contact. “I’m not sure why, but – I don’t think you should.”
Death sighed. “Perhaps not,” he agreed. “But you know as well as I do that everything ends. And there are some events which cannot be avoided. It would be foolish to try.” And he was gone.
Soon after that, he was gone.
Billie had watched the events on the scrying mirror, her lips pressed tightly together. When it was over, she leaned her hands on Death’s desk, head bent, and took a deep, shuddering breath. Then she straightened up and called the other Reapers to tell them what had happened.
They stared at her in shock.
“Who’s in charge now?” one asked.
“No one’s in charge,” Billie said.
“What about you?” came another voice. “You were his second-in-command.”
“Not officially,” Billie said. The Reapers stared back at her, looking lost. She closed her eyes for a moment.
“All right,” she said, reopening them. “I’ll keep things running as best I can. But I’m not replacing him. I’m here for the sake of organization, not to hand out orders.” She paused. “Well…maybe one. It’s not an order, so much as an idea. If you all agree.”
She looked around. They were listening intently.
“You all know who Sam and Dean Winchester are,” she continued. “They killed Death. But more importantly – yes, I said what I said and I think he would have agreed – they flout the rules of life and death constantly. He found it amusing. I don’t. And I think their nine lives are more than up. What I propose is: should either of the Winchester brothers die again, whichever of us is assigned to reap them is going to get a little careless. And those boys are going to find themselves in the Empty. Does anyone have any objections?”
The faces looking back at her were stony and fierce. Many were nodding. No one raised a protest.
“Good,” Billie said. “Now. We no longer have a boss, but we still have a job to do. I’m going to get back to it. I hope the rest of you will join me.”
A few Reapers disappeared that day, but most of them stayed.
In the busy days that followed, an assignment came across Billie’s desk at the hospital where, she happened to know, Sam Winchester was currently holed up.
“I’m taking this one,” she said. No one argued with her. And she finally got her chance to meet one of the Winchester brothers, and deliver her message. The look on his face was very satisfying.
Fall 2017
Billie awakens. Someone is shaking her shoulder.
“Get up, get up, come on,” says a grumbling voice. It sounds strangely familiar, although the stilted cadence is all wrong.
Billie blinks and rolls over to see…herself. Her doppelganger is standing in a black, blank world of nothingness.
“The Empty,” Billie says stupidly, recognizing the place. She’d brought demons and angels there enough times.
“That’s me,” says her doppelganger. “It’s, hmmm, just easier to show you this. I didn’t want you to start screaming when you saw my real form.” Billie watches her own mouth give a weird, twisted smile. “I hate noise.”
Billie rises slowly to her feet. She’d heard of the entity which ruled the Empty, but she’d never met it. Death had told her it slept, and to never wake it up.
Suddenly she remembers being accompanied here herself – by Kevin, of all Reapers. She was dead.
“Why am I awake?” she asks, wondering immediately if the Winchesters are somehow to blame. They don’t cause every violation of the natural order, but they have a hand in enough of them.
The Empty makes a displeased noise. “So I can give you these,” it says. Suddenly Death’s scythe is in its hand. It tosses it to her, and Billie catches it reflexively. The Empty holds out Death’s ring to her. Billie stares at it, nestled in the palm of what looks exactly like her hand.
“Take it,” the Empty snaps. “I’ve been looking for you for, oh, months and months and months. And just when I’d decided to take a break and have a little nap, I was woken up by a troublesome angel. I’m tired.”
Billie slowly takes the ring. “What am I supposed to do with this?”
“Put it on, of course,” the Empty says. “You’re the first Reaper to die since Death went. You’re the new Death. Congratulations.”
Billie blinks. This is very surprising, of course, but also somehow not surprising at all. Things are falling into place. Her dreams…
She slides the ring onto her finger. Instantly, reams of knowledge from throughout the universe seem to fall into her head. It should be confusing; utterly overwhelming. It’s not.
Her back straightens and she starts to smile.
“Now get out of here and let me get some rest,” orders the Empty.
“Wait,” Billie says. “Let me see your true form.”
The Empty stares at her for a second, then shrugs and changes. Billie looks at it steadily.
“Thank you,” she says after a moment. “Sleep well.”
***
Billie leaves the Empty and goes to the reading room, which is deserted at the moment. She looks around the familiar wooden shelves, the gas lights and brass fixtures, the fire ever-burning in the fireplace by Death’s empty desk. It feels as though she was just there, and it feels as though she has not been there for a long time. Her new perspective tells her that both views are true and untrue. She sees things very clearly now. Her vision is almost unlimited.
She touches one of the bookshelves and thinks that, though she doesn’t dislike this room as is, it seems like it’s about time for something a bit more modern.
Once she’s changed it to suit herself, she calls the Reapers to her. They stare at her ring and her scythe as she explains what’s happened.
“And now,” she says, “let me tell you about how we’re going to do things from now on.”
Genre: Gen, humor, philosophy (kind of)
Characters: Billie, Death, God, the Empty, tiny appearance by a Reaper OMC
Rating: Teen/PG-13
Word Count: 3500
Disclaimer: All for fun, none for profit.
Summary: As Billie sleeps in the Empty, she dreams about her life, her relationship with Death, and her general irritation with the Winchesters.
A/N: Written for the Swan Song Bingo, Billie!Death square (season 13). Takes place in early S13ish but with a lot of flashbacks. Title taken from Blue Oyster Cult's "(Don't Fear) The Reaper" because I had to. I'm so excited to finally be sharing this one, my friends!
Read on AO3
***
January 2017
Dying, Billie reflects as Castiel’s blade pierces her heart, hurts. She’s been ferrying souls for countless millennia, but she’s never known what it was like. She’s starting to understand why people get so upset about it.
The angels and demons in the Empty do not dream. They do not think or remember. Their sleep is nothingness. But Billie is not like them. She is becoming something more than she was.
Billie dreams. Billie remembers.
A very long time ago
Billie looked around. All was light, nearly formless. She was surrounded by her fellows. Reapers; she knew that much. She had come into being to serve Death, but she had only so much of an idea of what that meant.
“I made you these!” said a voice, though both ‘said’ and ‘voice’ didn’t really apply, and the words were thought, not language. In any case, communication was occurring and Billie could comprehend it. It came from a blindingly bright presence in front of Billie. The light seemed to be addressing a dark shape next to it.
“Why?” asked the shape, sounding wryly amused. “Don’t you have enough angels?”
“No, no, these are special angels, for you! You’re going to have a lot more to do soon, with all the things I’m going to be making. I figured you might want to, y’know, delegate.”
The dark shape seemed to regard the Reapers. “I don’t need them.”
“No, look, it’ll be great! Just take a gander at one.” Billie felt herself move without volition, drawing nearer to the light and the dark shape. “I call this one Billie. She could be, I don’t know, your assistant or something.”
“She?”
“Yeah, I’m trying out this thing called gender. It’s kind of weird and experimental, but really interesting. I get a female vibe from this Reaper, I think.”
The dark shape said nothing.
“Come on!” the light said, after a moment. “Don’t you like them?”
“I’ll take them,” the dark shape replied. “But you know I don’t accept bribes. Even you can die.”
May 2007
Billie dropped the day’s files on Death’s mahogany desk. As always, the reading room was lit using gas lamps with bright brass fixtures. The polished dark wood floor and darker wood bookshelves gleamed in the light. A cheerful fire blazed in the marble fireplace behind Death’s desk.
“Today’s notable deaths,” Billie announced.
Death nodded his thanks and reached out with his long, thin fingers to take the top file. “Anything interesting?”
“Not that one,” Billie said as Death opened it. “Kid was stabbed in the back. Demons were involved somehow, but it was another human that killed him. I’m not sure why it was flagged.”
“Sam Winchester,” Death read. He tapped the page. “Ah. Of the Winchester Gospels.”
“There are no Winchester gospels,” Billie said.
“No,” Death agreed. “Not yet.” He glanced up at her. “Haven’t you read the Supernatural books?”
“I’ve never even heard of them.”
“Not surprising. They’re not very popular, and wildly inconsistent.” Death sighed. “Their author doesn’t take constructive criticism very well.”
Death said this kind of thing sometimes. Mysterious pronouncements that made no sense. Billie had learned when he was likely to tell her more, and she didn’t think this was one of those times.
“Let me know if you need me for anything,” she said, assuming the conversation was at an end. She turned away.
“Billie.”
She turned back.
“I don’t expect that Sam Winchester will be dead for very long.”
She frowned. “What makes you say that?”
“Call it a hunch,” he replied. “I suggest you read the Supernatural series. They may shed some light on the situation.”
They didn’t. Billie breezed through them all that afternoon. Most were fine. Not really her taste. She threw Route 666 at a wall when she was done with it. But In My Time of Dying caught her attention.
It wasn’t long until she got word that Sam Winchester was back from the dead. His brother had made a demon deal. She brought the news to Death.
“You knew it would happen,” she said to him.
He shrugged. “I’m not surprised,” he replied. “What about you?”
“Not after reading the books. Of course the brother sacrificed himself.” She shook her head. “I don’t like it. They’ve both cheated death. Dean should have died after his heart attack or when Tessa came for him. These Winchesters don’t care about the rules. They’re going to be trouble.”
Death regarded her with his dark, fathomless eyes. “I suppose we’ll see.”
February 2008
A Reaper who looked like a young blond man approached Billie’s desk.
“Yes?” she said, looking up from her paperwork.
He held out a thick file, fingers trembling slightly. “I think you should take a look at this.”
Frowning, Billie accepted the file and opened it. Her eyes widened as she paged through the sheets. She looked up at the Reaper.
“You didn’t think to bring this up after twenty or thirty, Kevin?” she asked.
He shrugged helplessly, eyes wide. “We didn’t notice! I don’t know why. The reports were being generated, they were in plain view, we just – we didn’t see them!”
Billie slammed the folder shut, shot a glare at Kevin, and stalked off. When she reached Death’s desk, she brandished the folder at him.
“Dean Winchester has died eighty-seven times today,” she said.
Death raised an eyebrow. “That does seem a little above average.” He took the file and glanced through it.
“I told you the Winchesters were going to be trouble,” Billie said.
Death was smiling slightly as he perused a sheet. “Tacos,” he said, sotto voce. “I haven’t had a taco in decades.”
“How is this happening?” Billie demanded.
“The being responsible for this is more trouble than he’s worth,” Death said. “Stay out of it.”
“But whoever he is, he’s flouting the laws of death!” Billie exclaimed. “Not to mention time. He’s warping reality.”
“I’m aware. Let’s see how this plays out.”
At long last, the reports stopped coming in. Dean Winchester had been shot in a parking lot. This time, he was gone for good. Billie breathed a sigh of relief and went back to work.
For months, things were quiet. Business as usual. And then…
There was something very familiar about this day, Billie thought as she looked through the reports on her desk.
“Something’s going on,” she said to Death as she delivered the day’s files. “I’m having déjà vu.”
“Yes?”
“Reapers don’t get déjà vu.”
A trace of a smile passed across Death’s face. “Interesting,” he said, steepling his fingers and looking at her. “Do you remember Dean Winchester?”
“That punk hunter who should have been dead at least twice over? Sure.”
“Do you remember the day he wouldn’t stop dying?”
Billie frowned and started to say no, of course she didn’t; how would that even be possible? But something niggled in the back of her head; a flash of memory.
“Sort of,” she said slowly.
“Very interesting,” Death said. “You shouldn’t be able to at all. I’m one of less than a dozen beings who are capable of remembering.”
“Remembering what, exactly?”
“Time has folded in upon itself. It went on after that day, and now it’s back again.” Death shrugged. “Gabriel does like his little jokes.”
“The archangel Gabriel?!”
Death only smiled.
Billie glared at him. “You think it’s funny,” she accused him.
Death’s smile didn’t waver. “Gabriel has his moments.”
May 2008
Dean Winchester was dead; ripped apart by hellhounds and dragged downstairs. Billie hoped that this time, he was gone for good. But something told her they hadn’t seen the last of him.
September 2008
“Dean Winchester,” Billie said, “is like a cockroach.”
Death had invited her to have dinner with him. About six months ago, he’d started doing that sometimes. Billie liked it. She liked her boss, even though he could be infuriating.
“More like a cat, wouldn’t you say?” Death replied. They were strolling through a carnival. His idea of dinner was a deep-fried candy bar. Billie had gotten funnel cake. It wasn’t bad.
“Whatever he’s like,” Billie said, “it’s extremely annoying.”
“I think it’s funny,” Death said.
Billie rolled her eyes. “I know you do.” Death hadn’t giggled, exactly, when Billie had told him earlier that day. Death didn’t giggle. Billie would have been prepared to agree that it has been a quiet chortle, though.
“You’d better get used to it,” Death said. “I doubt he or his brother are going to stop anytime soon.”
“Shouldn’t we do something about it?”
“I’m not particularly inclined to,” Death said. “It’s amusing. And they’re part of a larger plan.”
“What plan? Yours?”
“You know perfectly well that I don’t plan.”
Billie pursed her lips. “God’s.”
Death gave an elegant shrug. “In any case, as long as I’m in charge, we aren’t going to interfere.”
Billie laughed. Death raised an eyebrow at her.
“You make it sound like there’s a time when you won’t be in charge,” she said. The idea was ridiculous.
Death took another bite of his candy bar before replying. “Even I can die,” he said. “Nothing in this universe, or any universe, is exempt.”
“Do you…think you’re going to?” Billie asked uncertainly. She didn’t think he could see the future, but he had a knack for predicting it. He knew so much.
“The possibility has crossed my mind,” Death said.
“Why?”
Death stopped walking and looked at her. Billie stopped, too.
“When things happen to cosmic entities,” Death said slowly, “there can be reverberations. Ripples, if you will, forward and backward in time.”
“And you’ve seen signs of this?”
“Possibly.”
Billie frowned. “What happens if you die? Will there be a new Death?”
Death was silent for a long moment. “Perhaps one day you’ll find out,” he said finally.
2008-2009
Billie was starting to get numb to it.
She rolled her eyes when she saw Sam Winchester’s name on a report. Killed by a lightning strike; back almost immediately when the wish was reversed.
Awhile later, a report dated 2014 mysteriously turned up on Billie’s desk. Dean had been killed by Lucifer. She checked the records, but Dean Winchester was alive. Billie brought it to Death, who told her not to worry about it and just file it under “Futures – Avoided,” which was not a category Billie had been aware of previously. She shook her head and did as she was told.
Then it was the younger one’s turn again. A report from the 1970s appeared, detailing Sam’s murder by Anna and resurrection by Michael. Billie quickly returned it to Sam’s increasingly thick file.
It was shortly after this that Billie was in New York with Death at a late-night French fry restaurant. They were chatting as usual when Death abruptly stopped talking.
“What’s wrong?” Billie asked.
Death’s lip curled in annoyance as he lifted his hands up. Billie could see something pale and silvery binding his wrists.
“What the hell is that?” she demanded.
“Appropriate phrasing,” Death replied drily. “It’s a spell. Lucifer.”
“That little pissant – ” Billie started indignantly.
“Yes,” Death interrupted. “He is.” He winced. “I have to go. He’s calling. Look after things while I’m gone.”
He vanished. Billie pursed her lips and returned to the reading room to gather the other Reapers and let them know what had happened.
It wasn’t difficult to run things in Death’s absence. There was a lot of work to do, but the Reapers kept themselves out of the Heaven/Hell showdown. Billie didn’t mind handing things back over to Death once he returned. He was in charge; those were the rules. Not a big deal.
“I met one of the Winchesters,” Death told her.
“Oh?”
“Yes. Dean.”
Billie tried to remember which of them that was.
“The elder brother,” Death clarified at her look.
Billie rolled her eyes. “He’s even worse than the other one.”
Death smiled ever so slightly. “I found him rather entertaining.”
“I’m sure you did,” Billie grumbled. “Well, Sam’s in the Cage now, and from what I hear, Dean has settled down to a normal life. Maybe we’ve finally seen the last of them.”
Death’s smile deepened a hair. “I’ve missed your optimism.”
December 2010
“You can’t be serious,” Billie said, as Death pulled on his coat. “You can’t go to him!”
“Can’t I?” Death asked calmly.
“Dean Winchester gets his heart stopped and summons Tessa and demands to talk with you and you’re just going to hop to when he says?!”
Death gave her a long, level look. “Of course not,” he said. “But I’ve been meaning to speak with him anyway.” And he was gone.
Billie hmmphed and went about reaping souls with a decidedly poor attitude.
Her appointments that day happened to be spaced close together and she was soon back in the reading room. Death was watching Dean Winchester in a scrying mirror. He asked Billie to join him.
“You gave him your ring?” Billie said, incredulous.
“I did. Just for the day.”
She shook her head, giving up entirely on trying to understand the way Death’s mind worked. When Dean refused to take the little girl, though, she didn’t bother to suppress an irritated noise.
“He hasn’t learned anything,” she said.
“No. But perhaps today he will.”
Later, Death declared that he was going to talk to Dean. He picked up an old-fashioned valise.
“You’re going to give him his brother’s soul back,” Billie said. “Even though he lost the wager.”
“The point,” Death said, “was not for him to win. It was for him to learn.” He nodded towards the scrying mirror. “You can watch our conversation, if you like.”
“You indulge them,” Billie said. “The Winchesters.”
Death gave a small shrug. “They grow on one,” he said, and disappeared.
September 2011
“Still fond of them?” Billie asked. She’d seen the Winchesters’ attempt to bind Death. He let her use his scrying mirror whenever she wanted. She did so only sparingly, but when he had disappeared unexpectedly, she’d judged it an appropriate time.
“A little less at the moment,” Death admitted. “But I have to admire their – what’s that wonderful word? – chutzpah. And that angel calling itself God needed to be taken down a peg.”
Billie nodded, but said nothing. She had the strangest sense of foreboding, but she couldn’t find any rational explanation for it. She decided it wasn’t worth mentioning.
May 2015
“Again? Really?” Billie said.
“He made taquitos,” Death replied. “It would be rude not to at least try them.”
“After he went all the way up to the edge and then refused to go with you last time you saw him?”
“That was the other one,” Death said patiently. “Sam. This is Dean. Regardless, I’m going.”
Billie’s hand shot out seemingly of its own volition and grabbed Death’s arm. He looked at her with a raised eyebrow. She didn’t release him.
“I don’t think you should go,” she said, not breaking eye contact. “I’m not sure why, but – I don’t think you should.”
Death sighed. “Perhaps not,” he agreed. “But you know as well as I do that everything ends. And there are some events which cannot be avoided. It would be foolish to try.” And he was gone.
Soon after that, he was gone.
Billie had watched the events on the scrying mirror, her lips pressed tightly together. When it was over, she leaned her hands on Death’s desk, head bent, and took a deep, shuddering breath. Then she straightened up and called the other Reapers to tell them what had happened.
They stared at her in shock.
“Who’s in charge now?” one asked.
“No one’s in charge,” Billie said.
“What about you?” came another voice. “You were his second-in-command.”
“Not officially,” Billie said. The Reapers stared back at her, looking lost. She closed her eyes for a moment.
“All right,” she said, reopening them. “I’ll keep things running as best I can. But I’m not replacing him. I’m here for the sake of organization, not to hand out orders.” She paused. “Well…maybe one. It’s not an order, so much as an idea. If you all agree.”
She looked around. They were listening intently.
“You all know who Sam and Dean Winchester are,” she continued. “They killed Death. But more importantly – yes, I said what I said and I think he would have agreed – they flout the rules of life and death constantly. He found it amusing. I don’t. And I think their nine lives are more than up. What I propose is: should either of the Winchester brothers die again, whichever of us is assigned to reap them is going to get a little careless. And those boys are going to find themselves in the Empty. Does anyone have any objections?”
The faces looking back at her were stony and fierce. Many were nodding. No one raised a protest.
“Good,” Billie said. “Now. We no longer have a boss, but we still have a job to do. I’m going to get back to it. I hope the rest of you will join me.”
A few Reapers disappeared that day, but most of them stayed.
In the busy days that followed, an assignment came across Billie’s desk at the hospital where, she happened to know, Sam Winchester was currently holed up.
“I’m taking this one,” she said. No one argued with her. And she finally got her chance to meet one of the Winchester brothers, and deliver her message. The look on his face was very satisfying.
Fall 2017
Billie awakens. Someone is shaking her shoulder.
“Get up, get up, come on,” says a grumbling voice. It sounds strangely familiar, although the stilted cadence is all wrong.
Billie blinks and rolls over to see…herself. Her doppelganger is standing in a black, blank world of nothingness.
“The Empty,” Billie says stupidly, recognizing the place. She’d brought demons and angels there enough times.
“That’s me,” says her doppelganger. “It’s, hmmm, just easier to show you this. I didn’t want you to start screaming when you saw my real form.” Billie watches her own mouth give a weird, twisted smile. “I hate noise.”
Billie rises slowly to her feet. She’d heard of the entity which ruled the Empty, but she’d never met it. Death had told her it slept, and to never wake it up.
Suddenly she remembers being accompanied here herself – by Kevin, of all Reapers. She was dead.
“Why am I awake?” she asks, wondering immediately if the Winchesters are somehow to blame. They don’t cause every violation of the natural order, but they have a hand in enough of them.
The Empty makes a displeased noise. “So I can give you these,” it says. Suddenly Death’s scythe is in its hand. It tosses it to her, and Billie catches it reflexively. The Empty holds out Death’s ring to her. Billie stares at it, nestled in the palm of what looks exactly like her hand.
“Take it,” the Empty snaps. “I’ve been looking for you for, oh, months and months and months. And just when I’d decided to take a break and have a little nap, I was woken up by a troublesome angel. I’m tired.”
Billie slowly takes the ring. “What am I supposed to do with this?”
“Put it on, of course,” the Empty says. “You’re the first Reaper to die since Death went. You’re the new Death. Congratulations.”
Billie blinks. This is very surprising, of course, but also somehow not surprising at all. Things are falling into place. Her dreams…
She slides the ring onto her finger. Instantly, reams of knowledge from throughout the universe seem to fall into her head. It should be confusing; utterly overwhelming. It’s not.
Her back straightens and she starts to smile.
“Now get out of here and let me get some rest,” orders the Empty.
“Wait,” Billie says. “Let me see your true form.”
The Empty stares at her for a second, then shrugs and changes. Billie looks at it steadily.
“Thank you,” she says after a moment. “Sleep well.”
***
Billie leaves the Empty and goes to the reading room, which is deserted at the moment. She looks around the familiar wooden shelves, the gas lights and brass fixtures, the fire ever-burning in the fireplace by Death’s empty desk. It feels as though she was just there, and it feels as though she has not been there for a long time. Her new perspective tells her that both views are true and untrue. She sees things very clearly now. Her vision is almost unlimited.
She touches one of the bookshelves and thinks that, though she doesn’t dislike this room as is, it seems like it’s about time for something a bit more modern.
Once she’s changed it to suit herself, she calls the Reapers to her. They stare at her ring and her scythe as she explains what’s happened.
“And now,” she says, “let me tell you about how we’re going to do things from now on.”
