A Bar Full of Death

A/N: Written for Trick or Treat Exchange 2016 for dreamiflame, in response to the prompt Death of the Endless meets other Deaths.

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Generally, if you know Death, you know she spends one day as a mortal every century. To truly live and die is a precious reminder of how important each life she takes is to the one she takes it from. She'd like to believe it's something she could never forget, but why chance it? Besides, for all the bitter-sweetness it holds, she always comes back renewed, with purpose and great stories from the experience. Stories that are sad, joyful, even horrific, but great all the same. She makes no secret of it. Anyone who knows Death has probably heard a story or two from her mortal adventures.

It's not the only special day on her calendar, though. There's one even her siblings don't know about. An additional day set aside every century to remember what it could be like to be a different kind of Death. In her realm, in her house, not too far away from her personal gallery, there's a door. It will only open once a century, though she can choose to open it any time during that century. It always leads to the same place, but that place is always different. It's not really in this universe, but neither is it outside. It just is. It doesn't even have a name, it just is.

Today when she opens the door and goes through it, what she finds on the other side is a bar. This is not unusual, a bar is a good place for a gathering, after all. Sometimes it's a country-western bar with music that's all nasal and twang from speakers on the wall. Sometimes it's a neighborhood dive where everything's just a little bit scuffed and the jukebox in the corner only plays twenty songs when it works at all. Once it was an upscale bar with gleaming oak and polished brass fittings everywhere, classy frosted glass dividers between plush booths. At least twice it's been a disco. Generally everyone tries to forget the time it became a karaoke bar, though Death found it funny.

Apparently whatever chooses the location is showing a sense of humor again, because today it's a perfect replica of the Skeleton Bar in Switzerland. She glances around and sees several familiar entities, but the one she's looking for isn't immediately obvious. Sometimes she wants to spend the time with someone as an example of what she doesn't want to be. Sometimes she wants to talk shop with someone who understands her purpose in a way no one outside this gathering ever can. Sometimes she just wants to hang out with someone whose company she enjoys, and that's how she feels today.

There's more than a few figures shrouded in heavy black cloaks, or wispy insubstantial ones. Several have ostentatious scythes leaning against the bar or the tables where they're sitting. She nods to the well-dressed older gentleman with the long dour face eating from a bag of pickle chips. He nods in return, before going back to his conversation with a horse skeleton in a white suit and hat. She hides a smile at the sight of what looks like a man with skeleton face paint and a blond wig telling the same old story about a ridiculous death he oversaw to an actual skeleton in a hoodie and shorts that she can tell is looking for an escape. Her eyes pass over a female skeleton in a purple robe who is trying to be talked into a game of Clue by her companion, a pair of only partially substantial robed figures playing chess on a set carved of bone, a drink rising and lowering by itself as part of its liquid disappears into its invisible imbiber, and a winged man with a beard talking to a dark green dog. A grim-faced fellow in a crown inclines his head towards the empty chair at his table, and she smiles but shakes her head in negation. He's not who she's looking for today. Her attention is drawn for a moment, understandably, to the young-looking female figure behind the bar in a bright red dress and candle-accented sombrero rummaging through the alcohol bottles behind the bar. Their eyes meet in the mirror, and Death reconsiders for a moment, but no, this isn't who she's looking for today either. Maybe next century.

Finally one of the darkly robed figures at a far table turns around and she can see a pair of glowing blue eyes set into a skeletal face. She smiles and heads in that direction. She's spent time with most of the other Deaths here, one year or another, but he's always been her favorite. As she gets closer, she can see the tiny robed skeleton sitting at the next table over with a raven and a man wearing a magical watch. She waves to them before taking a seat with her intended companion, settling in for the evening.

"Hello, Death!" she says cheerfully.

HELLO, DEATH.