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No matter how much you might plan for the worst, in life, there were moments that you simply couldn't anticipate.

Even if you thought you'd come up with every possible outcome, measured the situation for every variable, and planned your path as safely as you could, there might still be something that you didn't account for.

FWIP!

Emily didn't just learn that lesson; she had it literally bored into her flesh in the form of a bullet, screaming through the air before it passed through her flesh as easily as a hand through the water from a faucet. From her back, scarcely any blood leaked, but on the other side, it gushed and sprayed from the exit wound, and despite her years of training as an assassin, she found it nearly impossible to keep her composure.

She lifted her paw right to the hole in her chest and tried to cover up the wound, knowing that it wouldn't do even the least bit of good. Her legs, once moving in perfect, rapid succession, locked up at the knee. Gracelessly, she fell forward into the streaks of crimson vitality that already stained the street beneath her footpaws.

Being hit in such a vital spot didn't carry the same kind of pain that she expected. It felt so much like taking a needle, but rather than a quick, sharp pain that faded almost instantly, it lingered around, and was the only thing that could keep her conscious as she felt the overflowing blood within her chest cavity starting to spill into her esophagus.

The world was turning dark before her eyes actually closed, and her tail went limp behind her as a small pond of her blood formed around her torso.

Two final, faint spindles of smoke drifted into the breeze as the sniper loaded a second bullet into the chamber of his rifle and waited, but after a thirty seconds, there was no further movement, and his position would be compromised. He faded into the darkness of the night, as Emily faded into unconsciousness.

**

On the other side, there was no pain. There was no sensation of nausea, like there was when the bullet struck.

There was only the bitter and panic inducing sight of Emily, looking down upon her own body, entirely still, save for the blood that continued to gush from the wound.

"What...what is this?"

"Do I really have to explain it for you?"

The foxtaur whirled around, her training paying off even when she was outside of her own body. She swung right about at the source of the voice, but found her blow to be entirely ineffective; in fact, her clenched paw phased right through her target, taking with it only the faintest wisps of a black mist.

"Great...we've got another fighter."

A voice that was despondent and dripping with an eerie drawl filled Emily's ears, and she found them to be every bit as sensitive as they were when she was still alive. "Who...who are you? What the hell is going on?!"

Emily felt her question might have been rhetorical, when she actually gazed over her new stalker. He wore only a robe, but it was tattered in an impossible pattern, worn away by an eternity of ages gone by. He carried a tall and gnarled staff, with a long, curved sickle sticking far and away from it, making a terrifying scythe. His fur was dusty and gruff, bordering on the point of mangy, and his eyes were pure white pits of abyss.

He could be only one person, and whatever hope she had that this was just a bad dream faded from her as rapidly as the blood poured from her dying form.

"My name is Jack. Perhaps you've heard of me as The Grim Reaper."

Emily shifted uncomfortably. "I think I prefer Jack, to be honest...and this feels like a stupid question, but...am I-

"Dead? Yes. That bullet went right through your center mass, I'm afraid. It was almost instantaneous."

Gravity couldn't begin to measure the weight that Emily felt bearing down on her soul. Despite being little more than an apparition now, and literally floating inches off of the ground, she felt as though she were standing in quicksand and sinking fast. Whatever little mistake she'd made in her mission, it ended up costing her life, but in her selflessness, it wasn't her own shortcomings that she was truly worried about.

"Then...that's it. That's really it," Emily repeated to herself, trying to accept the reality of her situation. "Th-there's no going back from here?"

"It isn't looking good for you," Jack admitted, as he stood behind Emily without budging. His presence wasn't anything comforting to Emily, who lifted her right paw to clench her left arm uncomfortably. "But everyone has to meet with me, some day or another. I'm afraid that your day has come."

"All because I wasn't looking for one little sniper...all because of one bullet, even, I'll never get to see anyone again..."

Sympathy wasn't the kind of thing that Jack could afford to have in droves, as his entire job was helping people cross over into the afterlife, but he could see just how terribly shaken Emily was; not for herself, but for the people that she was letting down in her passing, and those who she truly cared about. Even in death, they came first in her world, and it didn't seem right to Jack that her life would end on such a sour note.

"I can't promise you your life back," Jack interjected before Emily could speak again, "But I can offer you a final goodbye, at least."

Emily felt her jaw curling up into a hopeful smile without a single provocation of her own will. "Y-you...you can really do that for me?"

"The world between life and death where we are now is a place where I can bend the rules," Jack admitted. "If you simply follow me, I can allow you to meet with the one person you most care about, one last time."

There was no need for Emily to explain who she most cared for. Jack was a being of some omnipotence, and to him, Emily's mind was already unraveled without her having told him a single thought. "What kind of power is this?" she asked, curious to how a symbol of death could influence the world in such a way.

"I can appear in dreams, when the moment calls for such an act," Jack explained rather quickly, as he turned away from Emily and started walking away from her. In hasty concern, she turned away from her body with a final wince and jogged to catch up, surprised at how quickly such an old being could move. "I've appeared in yours plenty of times, given the line of work that you took up."

"No need to remind me," Emily replied dryly. Her life as a contracted assassin didn't leave her many restful nights, and though she didn't recall ever seeing Jack in the exact form that she saw him in, right then, she was sure that she'd seen him in some form or another in one of her many nightmares.

"That's not something that I just do for fun, you see. Often, I do it because I am required to send a message to those who may be going down a truly dark path in life, and in as much, I can't speak directly to the person that you truly love. Only you can do that, Emily. I can only bring you to them."

"That would be more than enough for me," Emily suggested. "If you can just give me one last chance to see them again, perhaps I can leave the words with them that I should have when I was still alive..."

Jack was walking through what seemed to be an infinite darkness, and for some reason, Emily didn't feel unsettled by it. The knowledge that she was dead was something that she felt should have been more shocking, and whether it was delayed hysteria or merely a side effect of the way that she viewed death, she felt surprisingly sure of herself as she followed in the literal footsteps of death itself.

"There truly are no chances beyond this one," Jack pointed out, hoping that Emily would realize how serious his words were as a beacon of light appeared before the wandering pair, and slowly, it grew. First, it was merely a dot in the distance, but it rapidly spread wider and wider, acting like a tunnel that expanded until it finally enveloped Emily, and though Jack stood right by her side...

...Ty didn't notice him.

"Emily?! W-where did you come from?"

The spreading light gave way to a wide, open field of ankle-high grasses of the most vibrant green. Amidst all of the prairie land, only a single tree stood, but the many, healthy leaves upon it danced in the gentle breezes of a place that didn't exist in real life, but Emily knew it immediately: it was a place that Ty had described many times as his own version of what paradise should be.

"Do you...do you know what this is, Ty?" Emily asked, rather than actually answering the question outright.

"Yeah, it's Elysium...don't you recognize it?" he questioned again, looking just slightly concerned with his sister and her demeanor. "I know you've only been here once, but I thought for sure that you would remember it forever."

"I could never forget it," Emily said. "I just haven't been here in quite some time."

"You're always off on another mission here and there," Ty agreed. "It's a shame that you can't spend more time here with me...I cherish it, every time that you do."

Ty seemed content not to pry further about what Emily meant, and she rolled right along with it, not wanting to rouse suspicion that he might actually be dreaming. He certainly didn't seem to know it, and if the moment was real in his mind, she'd share in that fantasy, pretending it was a real moment, as well.

"I'm sorry that I haven't been around as much lately," Emily immediately followed up. "Your time is precious to me, Ty. I hope you know that."

"It doesn't always feel that way, but it's no hard feelings, Emily. You have your own life to live."

Though it was merely a dream, the words still cut deep into Emily, who did her best not to frown at the sentiment. Though Ty sat comfortably under the tree and smiled up at Emily, she found it hard to maintain anything close to a grin as she cursed her fate and the moment that lead to all of this.

"You're a big part of my life, Ty. You're almost my entire life."

Ty was blushing the moment that Emily finished speaking. "D-don't you think that's a little bit of an exaggeration?" he asked, before patting the ground next to him.

Emily was hesitant to change any part of the dream atmosphere around her, but Jack made a small gesture to the spot, as well, and slowly, she came to sit next to him. "It's no exaggeration at all, Ty. You're really all that I've got left in this world..."

One thing that no one could question about Emily and Tiberius was just how close they were. They were siblings of the tightest weave, often considered inseparable, and the truth was that they only had each other in the world. Fate wasn't kind to their lots, and with no other family to turn to, they relied as heavily on each other as siblings ever could.

"Did you ever think that perhaps you should look for a safer line of work?" Ty asked, and though within a dream, he could see just how desperately shaken Emily was at the prospect.

The dream was a lovely moment, and one that Emily would have loved to share in forever, but she could already see Jack approaching the tree from a distance, and though Ty still couldn't see him, his dream began to reflect the presence of the bringer of death. "It might be a little too late for that, Ty."

"Don't say things like that," Ty replied hurriedly, as he reacted the same way someone would when their sweet dream turned into a bitter nightmare. "It's never too late to change, no matter how many things you've done wrong in your life!"

Emily finally slipped her arms around her brother and leaned into him, knowing that her final moments with him were coming to a close. "It's sweet of you to have so much faith in me, Ty. You always did...maybe if I'd listened a little closer, I would have actually gotten the message in time."

The blue skies and endless fields of green were slowly fading into dark clouds and dying, wilted grass. "N-no...don't say things like that, Emily. Don't tell me that this is really the way it's going to end!"

"It...it is," Emily admitted, as she struggled to fight back her tears. "And I'm sorry that is has to be this way, but...I'm all out of time, Ty. When you wake up, I'll be gone, and...nothing in the world can bring me back."

It was hard enough for Ty to accept that the moment was all taking place in a dream, but the moment that he did, he realized what must be going on, and Jack became entirely clear to him in the background as Emily slipped out of his embrace, fading through his paws like grains of sand through tightly clenched pawtips. "E...Emily...please don't go! Please tell me this is just a nightmare!"

Emily could do a lot of things for her brother. She could make him feel amazing in ways that she might never admit to others, and would tell him anything to make him happy, but she could never lie to him. She could only turn in and press her lips against his in a final act of affection, before she was summoned back to Jack's side.

"Remember me fondly, brother..."

**

Emily wasn't sure just how long she'd been following Jack through the darkness. She was tiring of it already, and hoped that the afterlife would offer her something a little bit different, if this was, in fact, going to be her fate.

"Are you ready to meet with your final destiny?" Jack asked, only barely looking down at Emily when he addressed her. He seemed to regret that he had to take her away from her brother when he saw how desperately the pair needed each other, but rules were rules, and no doubt, Emily had taken her fair share of lives in the meantime.

There was no better time than the present to deal with the consequences of her actions, after all. "If that's all that there is left to do, then...yes. I'll meet it head on," Emily said, her voice unwavering in the confidence that it carried. "I've always been curious what was really waiting for me on the other side."

"Everyone is curious if they were right or wrong about who they praised in their physical bodies," Jack admitted. "It's got to be the most common question I'm asked, and it's somewhat satisfying to know that I never have to answer it."

From all of the darkness, a small door came into view, one that was just faintly tall enough for Emily to pass through.

"He's waiting for you on the other side of this door, Emily. All you have to do is walk through it."

There were no nerves, and no sweat on Emily's palm as she grasped the handle of the old, plain looking door and swung it open. There was deity waiting to greet her from the other side...

...There was only horrible, terrible pain as a brilliantly white light surrounded her form, and she sucked in a deep, full breath in her lungs, despite the blood that still seemed to be filling them...