SpaceAce - October Prep Month

October 7th, 2017 - Living After Death

“Living After Death”

A Short Story

Written By

PureSciFi aka
SpaceFaction

     A small barrel of a weapon was pointing at Villiam. From the angle of the weapon, it was pointed at his head. When Villiam moved his head so did the weapon. Villiam was bending over an expensive looking desk away from the weapon looking through the papers scattered on top of it. So, he didn’t see the weapon. But he did hear the laser bullet that came out of it. He spun around toward that sound. And that probably saved his life as the bullet soared right past him to explode into the wall right behind that desk.

     Villiam grabbed his hand weapon floating an inch next to his hip and fired a laser bullet from it. But it wasn’t aimed at the shooter. Instead, the bullet struck the weapon in the shooter’s hand. The shooter dropped it a second before it glowed red, then disappeared.

     “Flori, you’re the killer!” Villiam kept his weapon pointed at Floria. Only now it was aimed at her chest.

     “No, I’m not a killer. I’m sorry. I thought you were a Stealer of Secrets.”

     “Then why was that laser bullet aimed at my head?” Villiam asked.

     “I can answer that question,” said Gracea as she entered that room. Pushing Flori into it in front of her.

     “You don’t have to answer it. I already know it’s because she’s the killer. Why else would she just try to kill me too?”

     “Yes, she is the killer. But she’s not the only one.” Gracea gestured toward the entrance she just entered. Nineteen males and females, ten males and nine other females, entered. Each one had their hands in front of them as though they were connected together. But there didn’t appear to be anything there.

     Villiam looked shocked and confused. “They all did it. All of them killed our Adult Male Family Member and our Adult Female Family Member.”

     Smiling big, Villiam continued. “You did it. Gracea, you showed The Law they didn’t kill each other.”

     Now, it was Gracea who looked shocked. “You doubted that I would do it. I told you I would find their killer, and I did. And it only took two weeks to do it.”

     “At first, I thought that it was only one killer. Then I saw that they were struck several times each. That’s when I realized there was more than one killer. It didn’t take me long to figure out it was everyone on The Committee. After all, they were struck twenty times each.”

     Gracea took a deep breath before she continued. “They made it look like they killed each other. But no one wanted to be the one who actually did it. So, they all did it on a Heavy Shock setting. All those shocks combined is what killed them.”

     “I still don’t understand. Why didn’t they just strike them with laser bullets? They could have made them only have one per weapon. But randomized them so they wouldn’t know who did kill them. At least one bullet each would have been killed them.

     First, Gracea looked at the twenty killers. They didn’t look like they were ashamed of what they did. Then Gracea looked back at Villiam. “I was wondering about that too. But then I realized why they did it like that.”

     “They had to do it like that. If they had just laser bulleted them, then the bodies would have disappeared. And they didn’t want that. “

     Gracea took another deep breath. Then she let it out slowly. “If they just disappeared there was always a chance they might still be alive. They couldn’t take on the Family Empire. And that’s why they killed them.”

     “That makes sense. But I still don’t understand why they had to kill both of them. He’s the only one they had to kill.”

     “I wondered about that. And there are two reasons why they killed her too. First, they wanted it to look like they killed each other. Second, if they just killed him, she would have taken over the responsibilities of the Family Empire. They figured they could control us a lot easier than they could her.”

     Villiam started laughing. “They sure were wrong about that, went they? If they think they could control us, they were dead wrong. It’s a good thing they are going to live out the rest of their lives in The Core of Porma because If they weren’t, they would have wished they hadn’t gotten away with murder.”

     “Thanks to you they didn’t. Well done again, Gracea.”

=====-=====-=====-=====-=====-=====

     Villiam sighed. “What’s wrong, Villiam?” Gracea asked.

     “That’s just it. I don’t know what is wrong with me.” Villiam got up from his desk and started pacing around that room.

     “I’m not in bad health or anything like that. It’s kind of hard to explain. That’s why there is something wrong with me.”

     Villiam stopped and looked at Gracea sitting behind a desk that was an exact duplicate of his desk. The only difference is that Gracea faced a side wall while he still faced the entrance. “I guess if I had to explain it in only a few words it would be, that I’m bored.”

     “It’s been four months since the death of Stophin and Roina. And except for The Committee, nothing has changed much.”

     “That didn’t sound too hard to explain to me. And I feel the same way that you do about it being boring. But what can we do about that? The Family Empire is our responsibility now.”

     “I know we were raised to take over those responsibilities,” continued Gracea. “But we weren’t supposed to do that for another ten to twenty years.”

     Villiam shook his head. “That’s not what’s wrong. I, we, can handle the responsibilities. It’s just that this isn’t what I wanted to do with the rest of my life.”

     Gracea lowered her head. “I don’t really want to be doing this forever either. But what else can we do? This is who we are now.”

     “That’s what’s wrong. I don’t know what I want to do with the rest of my life. But it’s not this.”

     “I don’t want to be here either. But there’s nothing we can do about it.”
Villiam looked up through the glass ceiling toward the sky and beyond. “Maybe there is something we can do. Space, that’s the answer.”

     Gracea looked at Villiam in confusion. He had returned his gaze toward her. “We need more space? How is that going to help us.”

     After shaking his head no, Villiam looked up into Space again. “Not space with a small ‘s,’ but Space with a big ‘s.’

     Villiam pointed up into Space. “That’s where I want to be. I still don’t know what I want to do with my life. But there are thousand, if not millions, of ways for me to find out what I like, what I’m good at, and what I do want to do.”

     “That’s where I’m going.” Villiam looked back at Gracea. “And I want you to come with me.”

     “I would like to do that. But I can’t. What about the Family Empire? We can’t just give that up.”

     For several minutes neither spoke. It was Villiam that broke the silence. “That’s the best part about us leaving, we don’t have to give up anything. We can still control the Family Empire from our Family Spaceship.”

     “Let the workers do the day-to-day part of it. That’s what they are doing anyway. We can handle our part of it from anywhere. True, you will be in control most of the time while I’m trying to find my way in the universe. But you do that now anyway.”

     “What do you say, Gracea. That’s what I’m going to do. Do you want to join me?”

     Gracea smiled big. “Of course, I’m coming. Someone needs to watch out for you. Since you have a bad habit of always finding trouble wherever you go. You do it here on Porma. And I’m sure you will be doing it in Space too.”

Word Count = 1,340