A Scripta

Grim looked up from stirring his coffee absently when someone came into his peripheral vision. A blond-haired blue eyed man in running attire pulled out the chair next to him and sat down. Grim sat back and stared at him. "You've got some balls, Hermes."

"That's what Penelopeia said." Hermes put his feet up on the chair next to him. "Can I have that?"

"My coffee?"

"Yeah. You've been stirring it for a while."

Grim shook his head. "Oh, no, I'm not trusting you with anything."

"Oh, come on, it was just a little prank."

"Kal got his powers taken away!"

Hermes waved his hand dismissively. "Ares isn't that stupid."

"Well, he did it again when Kal failed to defeat Romulus."

"I stand corrected." Hermes looked at Grim as he turned back to his coffee. "Oh, c'mon Mike, you can tell me."

"I will tell you nothing."

"I'll tickle you with the feather of Ma'at."

Grim looked at him. "That's Egyptian. How did you get your hands on that?"

Hermes looked at him incredulously.

"Right. God of Thieves." He looked at his coffee again. "I had to kill people and then take their souls."

"So?"

"And I went to take one, but he fought me, and I cut him, and he disappeared."

"Ooooh," Hermes said.

"Is that a bad 'oooh' or a good 'oooh'?"

"Depends. You've been promoted. Sort of." Hermes held out his hand and a coffee mug appeared in it. "The Germans called it 'Totenengel'. The Angel of Death."

"I thought that's what I was."

"No, you were a Reaper and a psychompomp. You sent souls on, sometimes bringing them there yourself. Congratulations, you're an all-around agent of death. All you need is a pale horse."

"Somebody else has that," Grim muttered.

"Oh, the one Hades sent you after and you chose not to kill him? I think Hades was a little perturbed about that."

"Screw him. It wasn't Devil-Shot's fault. He didn't know."

"You Judged him also. That was out of your jurisdiction at the time." Hermes sipped the coffee. "Of course, that's well within your jurisdiction now, Totenengel."

"So what's the difference between what I was doing and what I'm doing now?"

"Not very much. You still go where Hades directs. You still bring the souls to their afterlife. But you have the power now to destroy their souls if they've been heinous enough to warrant it." He motioned to the knife at Grim's belt. "Scythe will know. She will destroy the soul as soon as you stab it."

"She?"

"Yes."

He looked at the knife. "What happens to the soul?"

"You want to know? They no longer exist. Within six months, their friends forget them. Within a year, immediate family will forget them. Two years, the living will no longer remember what they look like without pictures. The living will go to the grave, or the masoleum, or the area of their death, and there will be nothing there. The soul is gone."

"Gone-gone?"

"Gone-gone. Out of existance. Will never come back."

Grim looked down. "I really don't want to be the judge of that."

"Tell me, what was the grave sin that the man who's soul you destroyed do?"

"He cheated on his wife." Grim looked at him. "That's not so bad, I do it all the time." He blushed. "I did, anyway."

"But Scythe knew there was something more, and he still lied to you, the Grim Reaper. She knew, and the man wouldn't admit it. So, she ended his very existance."

"What about second chances?"

"Maybe he already had one. You do not know the history of every soul in existance." Hermes pointed to the knife. "She does."

Grim put a hand on the hilt of the dagger. It didn't feel any different. "So I'm just an instrument."

"You didn't know that?" Hermes got up with a grin and shoved his chair in. The coffee cup had disappeared. He leaned down and got in Grim's face. "We are all somebody's 'tool'."

"Only if we choose to be." Grim met his eyes, steely.

Hermes leaned back. "And you have, haven't you?" He laughed. "Eros' arrow struck you both squarely. At least both of you will be on the same wavelength." He started jogging in place, then took off down the street.