Abiogenisis - Chapter 4 Yknow The Song Title Thing Doesnt Really Work

Death: Gotta keep you people sane, y’know. I mean, if everyone was depressed all the time…well…Half of you people here don’t even appreciate mental health. Took you guys, what? 3000 years to finally realise “Oh damn, maybe people aren’t crazy because God said so.”

[Host enters]

Host: But I did say so.

Death: Shut up. You don’t exist.

[Host exits, Death materialises a fedora out of thin air and tips it.]

Death: But, y’know, a false purpose always works out. I mean, just a decade ago, I was strolling through my domain when I happened upon Camus. He was mumbling something about penitence, judges and killing an arab, I think. He was speaking French, and well, French isn’t a dead language yet.

[badum tss]

Susan: Did that really happen?

Death: Of course not. There’s like 9 billion of you here. Why do you think I employ bureaucrats?
for visiting.

Susan: Because you can’t be bothered to do it yourself? Sir.

Death: Ye- I mean, no, because it’s too much work. Do you know how man-I’ve had this conversation before, haven’t I? Hmm. Yes, yup, I remember now. Right, anyways. What was I talking about again?

Susan: You were on about purpose or something.

Death: Was I? That doesn’t seem like something I’d say. Too think-y for me. But yes, you all do sorta well with a sense of purpose. Well, except for the nihilists. But they’re a weird bunch at any rate. And besides, absurdists are way cooler. You believe in god, gods, your own ability to make meaning or nothing at all. Hey, host, am I right?

[Host enters]

Host: I hope you’ve realised that you have breached the maximum 4th wall break limit.

Death: Jokes on you, that was a 2.5 wall break. But anyways, you guys always need something to believe. Something to put your faith into. Even if that idea is that nothing is certain. But could you imagine what would happen if I spun you guys right round, and screwed up all your worldviews? Not very pretty, eh? And you can’t even die in here.

[Host hangs around, unsure of what he’s meant to do before he exits, stumbling a bit on the way out]

Susan: But if we’re in the enclosure, then who’s…

Death: Who’s the crowd? The madlads who jest and jeer at you guys, the madlads who giggle and point? Why, it’s the Host and I. Hiya, Host!

[Host enters from a balconey overlooking the stage]

Host: I’ll let you know that I have never looked down upon any of you.

Death: You are right now though.

Host: Hilarious.

[Host chucks a cardboard lightning bolt at Death before he exits]

Death: Egads! I am mortally wounded! This stray bolt cast forth by the unloving gods has struck me, piercing true to my heart!

[Death turns towards Susan, collapsing onto one knee]

Death: I…am dying. Oh, what treacherous irony is this? I have survived multiple, hundreds of walls being broken down and then subsequently collapsing on me. And now what? I am to be slain by a fool, and idiot whose sheer stupidity is somehow greater than that of the author? Oh, what nonsensical authorial intent!

Susan: You’re not really dying, are you, sir?

Death: Can’t you see that I’m in pain?

[Death bends over grasping at the right side of his body]

Death: It has hit my heart, Susan. I’m…I’m dying

Susan: Wrong side, sir.

Death: Shit, what? I mean er…Silence you fool. Are you mocking a dying man?

Susan: You’re neither a man, nor dying sir.

Death: You don’t know that. How dare you assume my life conditions, and my species.

Susan: Sir, you’re Death.

Death: How racist.

[Exit all]