"No. No! It doesn't have to be chess, but it at least has to be as complex as checkers. Not Rock-Paper-Scissors or Flip-A-Coin. We have standards here..."
On the other end of the phone was one of my newest hires, still fresh-faced and full of question on how to do his job. I know I often encouraged my rookies to ask me, their boss and employer, the hard questions since I was the friendly boss and whatnot, but there were times when I wish I would just refer them to their more senior colleagues. This being one of those times. What games were and were not appropriate for when the client wanted to compete for their soul was Day One stuff.
"... And none of those fuckin' D&D or fantasy roleplaying board games either. Gygax might have gotten away with it but no one else. Are we straight? Good."
Hanging up the phone, I leaned back in my chair and sighed. Dealing with all of my employees was a chore, or a downright hassle sometimes, but it still beat the alternative. It was either that, or back to the old ways. I'd put on the Cloak and pull my scythe off the wall rack, make myself look like a skeleton, and then do the whole "The bell tolls for thee" routine by myself again. I kept up with the endless parade of souls before, but when the world population ballooned standards had to be dropped in favor of efficiency. Then even that wasn't working anymore. That's when I started hiring other people to do it for me, and it all grew from there.
Now I can't even remember the last time I took the guise of a skeleton in a hooded cloak and pointed at someone to come with me. For years now I've been in the form of a tall, handsome Human with black, slightly-messy hair to my neck. Of course my body looked fuckin' great, ripped like those Human jeans models I've come across. Instead of a raggedy old cloak, I wore a simple black business suit and tie. I also preferred to go by "GR" or "Mr. Reaper" to my business associates. Instead of guiding souls to the afterlife myself, I now have ranks of "Reapers" to go around and do it for me, assigned to different sectors and hours and generally doing everything I did, but on a grander scale, and they were paid. The only time the souls actually saw the face of the ACTUAL Death was... well... Almost never now. Whatever.
At least I wasn't the only one keeping up with the times. Looking out the window of my big corner office, behind the big obsidian desk Mr. Lou had given me when I started my company (Which I still thought was gaudy as all Hell but it WAS from Hell I suppose), I saw the city that had grown up on the side of the Styx. All manner of supposedly fantasy/mythical/legendary/religious/etc. being lived and worked here, doing their respective jobs invisible to the Humans, until they died or the Big G-Man decided to mess with them. Speaking of which, I had a meeting scheduled with one of the Seraphim soon-ish for the annual performance review. They were probably gonna ask how I was doing on picking off some of the best of the Humans from the last generation, and I was going to ask if Mary had any appearances scheduled for the coming year, and what she would be appearing on/in. I pressed the button on my desk intercom and asked for my Secretary to come-in and give me the low-down on today's take.
(Looking for at least one(1) female. You can play the secretary, the Seraphim, a soul, or whatever. The options are open! Please PM if you have questions, comments, ideas, etc. Perhaps more males and females can come-in later.
On the other end of the phone was one of my newest hires, still fresh-faced and full of question on how to do his job. I know I often encouraged my rookies to ask me, their boss and employer, the hard questions since I was the friendly boss and whatnot, but there were times when I wish I would just refer them to their more senior colleagues. This being one of those times. What games were and were not appropriate for when the client wanted to compete for their soul was Day One stuff.
"... And none of those fuckin' D&D or fantasy roleplaying board games either. Gygax might have gotten away with it but no one else. Are we straight? Good."
Hanging up the phone, I leaned back in my chair and sighed. Dealing with all of my employees was a chore, or a downright hassle sometimes, but it still beat the alternative. It was either that, or back to the old ways. I'd put on the Cloak and pull my scythe off the wall rack, make myself look like a skeleton, and then do the whole "The bell tolls for thee" routine by myself again. I kept up with the endless parade of souls before, but when the world population ballooned standards had to be dropped in favor of efficiency. Then even that wasn't working anymore. That's when I started hiring other people to do it for me, and it all grew from there.
Now I can't even remember the last time I took the guise of a skeleton in a hooded cloak and pointed at someone to come with me. For years now I've been in the form of a tall, handsome Human with black, slightly-messy hair to my neck. Of course my body looked fuckin' great, ripped like those Human jeans models I've come across. Instead of a raggedy old cloak, I wore a simple black business suit and tie. I also preferred to go by "GR" or "Mr. Reaper" to my business associates. Instead of guiding souls to the afterlife myself, I now have ranks of "Reapers" to go around and do it for me, assigned to different sectors and hours and generally doing everything I did, but on a grander scale, and they were paid. The only time the souls actually saw the face of the ACTUAL Death was... well... Almost never now. Whatever.
At least I wasn't the only one keeping up with the times. Looking out the window of my big corner office, behind the big obsidian desk Mr. Lou had given me when I started my company (Which I still thought was gaudy as all Hell but it WAS from Hell I suppose), I saw the city that had grown up on the side of the Styx. All manner of supposedly fantasy/mythical/legendary/religious/etc. being lived and worked here, doing their respective jobs invisible to the Humans, until they died or the Big G-Man decided to mess with them. Speaking of which, I had a meeting scheduled with one of the Seraphim soon-ish for the annual performance review. They were probably gonna ask how I was doing on picking off some of the best of the Humans from the last generation, and I was going to ask if Mary had any appearances scheduled for the coming year, and what she would be appearing on/in. I pressed the button on my desk intercom and asked for my Secretary to come-in and give me the low-down on today's take.
(Looking for at least one(1) female. You can play the secretary, the Seraphim, a soul, or whatever. The options are open! Please PM if you have questions, comments, ideas, etc. Perhaps more males and females can come-in later.
