Chapter 1 – Chap 1

"Good evening, sir, may I come in?" the salesman asked. "I have quite the sales pitch for you."

The salesman beamed, a hopeful gleam in his eye. I didn't have anything better to do that night, so I smiled back and motioned for him to come in. He wore a black suit with tie to match. He was a little portly for a man living off the flighty whims of others. I imagined many of them lived from one sale to the next. And the traveling would of course keep them on their feet.

I offered the salesman a drink, and he nodded with a strange kind of grace.

"Tea, thank you. Earl Grey if you have it."

I put a kettle on, and tried to watch him from the kitchen without him noticing. The salesman seemed to be glancing around the room, happy to be there. Almost grateful.

When the tea was ready, I brought it in a small cup, a porcelain plate on the bottom. I'm not sure why, but it felt like I wanted to impress the man. As if he was…important.

The salesman smiled as I handed him the tea.

"Dreadfully sorry, but I neglected to introduce myself. The name is Blackmore. Charles Blackmore. I guess I forgot to tell you because I am so excited by what I'm selling. Have you ever…done something you weren't proud of?"

"Sure," I said, pursing my lips. "Haven't we all?"

Charles laughed lightly, a mirthless thing which seemed designed to defuse the tension.

"And your sister? What about her?" Charles was either very perceptive, or had some supernatural ability. How the hell did he know I had a sister?

"I'm getting a little uncomfortable with this conversation, Mr. Blackmore," I said.

Charles smiled again. "Well…I think you would be quite comfortable given the nature of what I'm selling."

"And that would be?"

"Everyone has thought about it, no? The great philosophical question? Whether you are a Christian or not, we all sit down and think about what will happen after at some point in our lives. Heaven or hell? Even atheists are scared of eternal hellfire in their deepest dreams," Charles said, that damn smile still on his face, like it was painted on or something.

"Get to the point," I said.

"What if I told you I am selling packages, of varying quality, which would ensure you never step foot in eternal damnation?"

"I'm no stranger to bullshit, Mr. Blackmore."

"A salesman yourself?"

"No, but my grandfather was. Biggest fraud he ever pulled on me was selling me a penny for a nickel."

Charles politely laughed again. "Did he sell you that story, too?" No, Miles. I am not selling you bullshit. Sign the dotted line and avoid hell. Simple as that."

I realized I never told the man my name.

Charles looked like he was about to say something more, then his cell phone rang. He answered it.

"So sorry, looks like I have to take this. Think over my offer, will you?"

I figured that point was a good time to check on my sister. On the way to her room, I thought of my grandfather again, for the first time in years. I remembered his sales pitches. We would laugh afterward at the way he conned me.

"And remember, every salesman is a con. Every. Damn. One."

I wondered what Mr. Blackmore's angle was, what he wanted out of me. Every salesman wanted money, or some form of it. "This for that" as my grandfather put it. Some form of compensation.

I opened the door a crack to my sister's room. She has had an unnamed disease for many years, and no doctor has been able to diagnose her correctly. But she is bedridden and has trouble speaking. She can speak, but it is difficult. Fragmented.

"Don't want to get your hopes up, sis…but I know you're thinking about what happens next. After, you know…I just mean, I would do the same in your position. Anyway, salesman just stopped by. Says he's selling alternatives to Hell. I know what you're going to say. Bullshit. I said the same thing. Except, truth be told, I don't know what's on the other side. Wouldn't it be nice to have some certainty?"

My sister's eyes sparkled with hate. I knew she always blamed me for what happened to her. She said my constant negative thinking brought the illness upon her.

"Too…late," my sister replied, voice barely above a whisper. She went back to staring at the wall, and I told her I would bring her some food later. Make sure it was mashed up, just how she liked it.

I closed the door and hurried down the short hall. Charles waited in the same chair as before. He smiled as I entered the room.

"Have you had time to think about my offer?" Charles asked.

"Well, you haven't said much about these alternatives. How do I know they are any better than Hell?" I replied. I realized then my tone was a bit harsh. The look on Charles face said it all. It was a brief flicker of surprise and awkwardness, and I could tell the man was uncomfortable with anything beyond his sales pitch.

"We have many pleasing packages. The future is all about customization, after all."

Charles began to outline them.

The first one was a bit suspicious. You had to give up your body and soul, the latter only temporarily as a kind of collateral. Once the people studied your body, and extracted all they could, you would be reincarnated into a different body.

"My employers have a particular interest in your sister. That mysterious illness she has had for years is quite the mystery. I recommend this option for her especially."

"And for me?" I asked. "Which option would you recommend for me?"

Charles went further down the list. "We try to find alternatives that mirror the customer's own circumstances. Or context in some way, whether past or present. You're less of a clear cut case, so I have two clear alternatives for you."

According to Charles, I could live a fairly pleasant or monotonous afterlife of taking care of the one-eyed being inside a cottage near the shore of some infinite sea. All the creature comforts I could want, but I couldn't leave the cottage for months.

The second option was I had to live in the footsteps of my grandfather. Prowling a parking lot lined with cars, trying to get other people to agree to a devil's bargain. This option had a much shorter timeframe. A few weeks.

Charles said I could have a "trial" of each of these options. Which sort of killed two birds with one stone. I had a very hard time believing what he was saying. Second, I wasn't sure either one really appealed to me. Getting a temporary preview would be preferable.

"Let's say I take you up on the offer of a "trial" afterlife, when does it start? And what happens to my sister? I can't just sign her rights away, and someone needs to care for her during that time," I said.

"Your sister will be…taken care of, I assure you. She can be transported to a temporary care facility until your trial is over."

I thought for a minute. This all seemed so absurd, a traveling salesman saying my sister could be transported to a temporary care facility. How could someone like him have connections like that? Signing the dotted line seemed crazy, but he did seem to go into detail about what would happen.

There was just one thing that nagged at me.

"You're a salesman, so what do you want in return?" I asked.

"A valid question, but one I'm only willing to answer once your trial is over," Charles replied. "Just consider it an extended vacation," he said.

After thinking it over, I chose the car salesman afterlife. I wondered what else was on the list, the "non recommended" afterlives, but Charles said he would only show me once my trial of at least one of the alternatives to Hell was completed.

What I had to do was scary enough. Before I signed the dotted line, Charles assured me it was a well worn process that all of his customers survived. He explained that I needed to be sedated before crossing over to the other side.

I would wake up in the afterlife. I had to put a lot of trust in some unseen medical professional. Someone who would stick a needle in my arm and sedate me. Not to mention what would happen to my sister. Charles kept assuring me that everything would be fine with her. Her care would be more than adequate.

I realized I had to trust Charles. I mean, I wasn't exactly a Christian. Although I did have a vaguely spiritual belief system and part of that was believing in the possibility of an afterlife. What I was doing I was doing for both myself and my sister.

He handed me a thick bag to put over my head, and I put it on, limbs shaking. Now I was scared, but I knew I had to go through with this. He led me out the door, and I could hear my sister calling me. Before we exited the front door, he said his employers would send in the proper medical professionals to tend to my sister. There was a steadiness in the man's voice that made me believe the words.

I could hear the whisper of the grass underneath my shoes, and Charles said that he was opening the car door so that I could get in. We drove for what felt like close to an hour. My ears picked up the steady hum of traffic until about the last ten minutes. Then everything got quiet except for the sound of our own car. It felt like we were going through an underground parking complex, and this continued for several more minutes before we came to an abrupt stop.

"Don't worry, you'll be in the hands of proper medical professionals soon. I should warn you, there are a few other…modifications you'll need before crossing over to the other side."

I began to protest, but Charles cut me off.

"A few, very light modifications, I might add!" he said, then got out. He opened the car door, and I stood up on wobbly legs.

"I should remind you that you have already signed your rights away. Temporarily, but you must have these modifications, and you must experience the other side for at least the several weeks outlined in the contract."

We walked, went through a door, and stopped. I heard a large metal door slam shut behind me. Charles took off the hood.

I was in a sterile looking corridor lined with doors. Charles put a finger to his lips and pulled out a gun. He must've thought that the contract wasn't enough of a deterrent. He kept the gun against my back until we reached the massive steel door at the end.

"Look, Charles, I-I'm not sure what I signed b–,"

"The administrator demands complete silence in the lab!" Charles whispered. "Just keep your mouth shut and you will survive!"

I passed through the door and waited for Charles to close it behind me. It wasn't long before I felt the gun pressed up against my back.

Then a pain exploded in my head. I passed out cold.

I was floating in my dreams. A blinding white light, then the pearly gates. I kept floating there until I woke up gasping for air.

My vision was blurry, and all I could make out were these large black suits, vacuum tubes going from their abdomens to their foreheads. The sound of something being pumped from one end of the tubes to the other was almost deafening.

"He's awake. He shouldn't be awake!" came an intimidating, gurgling voice. "He needs to be sedated again!"

I felt terrified. I was being operated on by monsters, and there wasn't anything I could do about it.

I tried clinging to consciousness, but the futile effort only sapped more of my strength, and I lost consciousness yet again.

I floated in my dreams again–but everything became black and inactive, as if my brain had been turned off. When I awoke, I woke groggily. The edges of my vision were blurry.

When I was finally able to lift my head, a piece of paper stuck to it. My hands failed to obey me the first several times, but I finally managed to pull it off.

It looked like a form someone would sign when they purchased a car.

Then a large hand grabbed my arm, and I saw another one of those large black suits, actually up close and given the fact much of the sedative had worn off, my perception was much more accurate.

It looked like a large black garbage bag, and the tube running from its forehead to its mouth seemed like something out of the 1950s. Terror began to build in me as I thought it wanted to operate on me again.

"So, you're our newest recruit, huh?" the garbage bag said. Despite the friendly words, the tone of its voice and how it looked still made me fearful.

"I guess so," I said.

"Now, now, don't be shy. Based on how I understand it, you won't be with us long. Or at least, not as long as I've already been here. "Why don't you follow me to the break room, and we'll begin your orientation."

I got up uncertainly, legs still wobbly. Head pounding.

I looked out the window and wondered where the fuck I had been taken to.

Outside, I saw rows and rows of cars. They stretched so far I couldn't tell when they actually ended. A sky thick with grey-ish black clouds also seemed to go on forever.

"Looks like it might rain today," the humanoid garbage bag said. "Then again, it rains here every day. Better get used to it."

I wondered about my sister then. Specifically, if Charles had stuck to his promise about providing for her adequate care.

I also wondered about my own fate. Charles said nothing about me being operated on. It stood to reason that there were plenty of other surprises in store.

Even though this afterlife was supposedly temporary, I knew I couldn't let my guard down.