Daemon

baby.’ A pause. ‘You can find it in Hindu legend, Sumerian mythology. Shit, you find it in modern folklore, like Rip van Winkle.
    ‘Although Rip van Winkle didn’t die. He
slept
. But that’s the damned point: death as sleep. Sleep as death. Isn’t our lifea cycle of death and rebirth? Sleep and awakening? The promise of eternal life is a threat unless you get to start over. The myth-makers knew that. They weren’t dummies, man.’
    The clattering of metal tools.
    ‘They were the ones who invented rhyme and meter – the programming language for human memory in preliterary civilizations. It was a cultural
checksum
– a mnemonic device. You couldn’t fuck with the code or the rhymes didn’t work; and if the rhymes didn’t work, people noticed. And so the knowledge of a people was passed down intact. It was a shamanic code. If you fucked with the code, then society lost its collective mind. Smell me?’
    A pause.
    ‘Hey, I think our boy’s coming around.’
    Sebeck opened his eyes and slowly focused on a pasty-faced twenty-something kid sporting a tangled mane of black hair. A few days’ beard shadowed the kid’s neck and climbed higher than usual up his cheeks. This was a hairy guy.
    Sebeck blinked at the overhead lights. He coughed and tried to sit up. A rock-hard surface greeted his elbows when he tried to push up. He immediately abandoned the attempt as his head began to swim.
    The hairy kid leaned in close. ‘Hey, bro, sit back for a few. You’re still trying to metabolize the meds.’
    Sebeck noticed the kid was wearing a lab coat. He tried to remember where he was. His brain was mashed potatoes.
    Sebeck’s voice croaked. ‘Where is this?’
    ‘Phoenix Mortuary Services. I call it PMS.’
    Sebeck tried again to sit up, and he pushed aside the kid’s hands when he tried to help. ‘Who—’ He stopped short; his throat was sore as hell. He put a hand to his larynx. No exterior damage.
    Sebeck leaned to one side and looked around. His eyes tried to focus to a greater distance. He was in a long room with several medical examination tables. Oak cabinetry lined thewalls. A strong chemical odor assaulted his nose. He’d smelled this before. Formaldehyde.
    Sebeck snapped alert; the body of an old man lay naked on a nearby metal table. The old man was definitely dead because his body had the pallor and flattened appearance that comes when blood pressure and breath leave the human frame.
    ‘Where am I?’
    ‘Like I said, my man: funeral home. That’s where they send dead people. It’s the law. And you, my friend, are legally dead. Got the paperwork to prove it.’
    Sebeck looked around for a few moments more, then brought his gaze back to the kid. ‘Who are
you
?’
    The kid wiped his hand on his lab coat, then extended it. ‘Laney Price. Body prep. I take out the pacemakers and shit like that. That stuff’ll blow up if it goes in the furnace.’
    Sebeck ignored Price’s hand and tried to shake his head clear. He glanced down, then swung his legs over the edge of the table and sat up.
    Price rushed to hold him steady, but Sebeck pushed him back. He glanced down at his own body. He was wearing casual slacks and a pullover shirt. Next to him on the table lay his crumpled prison khakis. He picked them up, balling them up in his fists.
That’s right
. He remembered now. He had just been executed for murdering federal officers. He was the most hated man in America.
    He dropped the khakis and sat motionless, staring at his own hands. A wave of emotion overcame him, and he started to breathe in fits.
    He was alive.
    Price clapped a hand around his shoulder. ‘Hey, Sergeant, you’re not dead, man. Relax.’
    Sebeck threw off Price’s arm and grabbed him by the throat. ‘What the fuck is going on!’
    Price extricated himself as Sebeck nearly swooned from the effort. ‘You tell
me
. You brought me here.’
    Sebeck was still trying to clear his head. God, his throat hurt. ‘What are you talking about?’
    ‘Look …’ Price stomped off and tore a newspaper clipping from its place on a nearby bulletin board. He came back to the examining table and pointed at the clipping – a file picture of Sebeck below the headline
Sebeck’s Macabre Message
.
    ‘Message received, compadre.’
    Sebeck grabbed the article. It was months old. His head started to clear as the adrenaline kicked in.
It worked
. The Daemon had saved him.
    But why?
    Before he could ask another question, Price tossed him a