The Perfect Job

Isaac had decided long ago that he had, finally, found the perfect job.  Granted, it wasn’t a glamorous job.  He didn’t do any of the real work here.  Other people did the dirty work.  There were people that prepared the bodies, that sold the caskets, and that cleaned the floors.  But he wasn’t any of those.  In fact, when he thought about it, he found it kind of humorous that someone actually paid him to watch the morgue overnight.  The hardest part of his job was not falling asleep.

Sure, it was creepy at first.  Dead bodies weren’t supposed to move, but they did occasionally make strange noises.  Still, those were peanuts to what your imagination would do with the sounds an empty building makes at night.  Isaac wasn’t one that was easily fazed, though.   

He knew that the company he kept these late nights wasn’t going to make any demands of them.  He could listen to his music as loud as he wanted with out fear of waking the dead.  From time to time, he even went into the cooler to look at them, lying so still under their sheets.  For the most part, he didn’t bother them, and they didn’t bother him.

Tonight was no different.  Isaac had locked things up when he arrived and settled down to watch a rerun of Futurama.  Already half way through his shift, he had no worries as he started to prepare his lunch in small break room microwave.  Finishing the spaghetti with meat sauce leftovers, he began to think about one of the late night deliveries that had been brought in earlier.  His curiosity finally getting to him, he decided to test strength of his stomach and take a peak.

He was sure he had locked the cooler already, but apparently not, because it was slightly ajar when he approached it.  Unsurprised he proceeded inside.  He’d missed things like that before; he was just lucky he usually found such mistakes before the staff arrived in the morning.  What did shock him was the fact that there seemed to be a body missing.

There were five gurneys, but only four of them were occupied.  Pointlessly, he started to look around, convinced it must be somewhere nearby.  He was confused.  Dead people didn’t just get up and walk off, especially ones that had been beaten to a bloody, messy pulp like this one had been.  Slightly paranoid, knowing that it’s absence would be blamed on him, he left the cooler.

Maybe one of the morticians had come in to work on that specific body.  That didn’t jive with the fact that the gurney was still in the cooler, but he decided to check anyways.  Sure enough, the light was on in the preparation room, and someone was in there moving about.  Much calmer, he walked in to the room.

“Perfect,” said a voice as he came in. 

The sight before Isaac made no sense to him.  As hard as he tried, his mind just couldn’t process it.  Sitting on the edge of a table was the dead man that had come in earlier.  But he clearly wasn’t dead, despite what he looked like.  In the hands of the much abused and injured body was a needle and thread, and it was attempting to sew up a very large gash cut into his chest.  It hadn’t gotten very far yet, and Isaac could still see exposed ribs sticking out through the cut.

“Um…” Isaac stammered, not knowing what to say.  “What the fuck?”

His mutterings were answered by a very wicked smile on the face of the once dead man.

“Please,” the stranger began.  “Allow me to explain.  You see, some people will only willingly give up information when they think you are dead.  Or when you are dead.  Anyways, I certainly didn’t mean to alarm you.  But since you’re here, could you hand me those scissors?”

Dumbfounded, Isaac found himself reacting before he could think.  Too soon he frighteningly close to the man.  Somewhere in his mind, a voice was screaming that this was a horrible, horrible idea, but he couldn’t stop himself.  He seemed to be drawn toward the man.

“Nope,” the man said, resting his hand on Isaac’s shoulder.  “That’s no good.  The damage is too extensive.  I really hadn’t intended to do this, but I think I’m much more valuable than you are in this world.  And believe me, this will hurt me much more than it will hurt you.  At least, in a way.”

Indeed, Isaac hardly felt it when the knife sunk deep into his neck.  He barely felt the ragged lips of the dead man on his throat, drinking in eagerly the life force which flowed from the gash.  He was dead before he even recognized the full level of danger he had been in.

A few moments of silence followed the sound of the dead body falling to the floor, followed by sounds of wincing and several expletives.  A short time later, Zet stood up from the table, glancing around for a mirror.  Finding none, he looked down at his clothes.

“Shit,” Zet began.  “I really liked this suit too.”

With a dejected sigh, he hefted the body of the dead guard and walked swiftly to the cooler.  After swapping clothes with the corpse, he used a scalpel to make an effort to mimic the wounds he had once featured on his own body.  Finally covering the boy with a sheet that had once covered himself, he quickly made his way out of the building.  As he opened the door to exit the building, he caught himself in a decorative mirror nearby. 

Smiling his deadly smile, once again perfect, he left the morgue, in search of his next victim.  He still had some deeper wounds to repair, and for that, he’d need to sate himself at least one more time.  But there was time for that… all the time in the world.

Word Count: 996