Death's House- Saturdayish Fandom time, and also 17 years ago
Susan had things to do and she knew it. She also felt the need to spent at least a little time as a teenage girl, which was why she was staring at herself critically in the mirror in her mother's bedroom.
The duty had begun to change the way Susan looked at things. It made her angry. At the same time, it made a strange sort of sense. Well, except for the parts that were stupid, like not interfering when you really should. It had also begun to change the way she looked at herself. First off, her name was all wrong. No one named Susan should be ushering anyone into the afterlife, whatever that afterlife might be. That job belonged to someone with just a better name, perhaps one with an X in it.
Her clothes were wrong, too. She'd worn the traditional black robe earlier, but it didn't seem to fit. She had the same dress she'd been wearing, but it was.... fine. It befitted someone named Susan. She wasn't even about to try any one of her mother's pink clothing monstrosities.
"Hold on," she said to her reflection. "I can create things, can't I?"
She tested it first. All she had to do was think of a cup, and a cup appeared. True, it had a skull and crossbones pattern on it, but there was only so much she could do.
"Well then," she said. "I don't want something soppy and posey. No silly black lace or anything worn by idiots who write poetry in their rooms and dress like vampires and are vegetarians really."
Clothes sort of fell onto her reflection. Black, of course. It was practical and fairly simple. "Well, maybe a bit of lace," she decided, making alterations. "And... perhaps a bit more... bodice."
As the alterations made themselves, Susan nodded into the mirror. It didn't look like anything a Susan would wear, but it looked right for her, and right for what she was doing.
"It's a good thing you're here," Susan told her reflection, "or I'd go totally mad."
*****
After playing dress-up with herself, she'd gone to the stables and found Binky. She saddled him, mounted, and once he'd taken her to the cornfield- don't ask her why there was a cornfield- she whispered, "I don't know how you do this. But you must be able to do it, and you know where I want to go."
Binky appeared to nod. He trotted forward, and then picked up speed, and the sky flickered, just once.
It felt sort of anticlimactic, especially when Susan saw that despite just traveling back in time nearly seventeen years, everything mostly looked the same. The cornfields were gone. Those had apparently been a new and very confusing addition. And, well, Binky was in the stables.
Susan dismounted and led him to the empty stall next to himself. "I'm sure you two know each other," she said helpfully before going into the house.
She found him in the room with the lifetimers. There was no mistaking his voice, even if she entered by creeping along the shelves so that no one noticed her. When she reached the end of the shelves, she saw Death standing over the redheaded boy who would one day be her father. There were red marks on his cheek, like burns, after Death had slapped him.
Susan raised her hand to the pale lines on her own cheek. It wasn't supposed to work that way. She shouldn't have that mark...
Her mother stood pressed against a pillar. She'd been a heavier girl, black hair with a white streak, the inverse of Susan's, and 100% more manageable. Her fashion sense had improved, too. Susan had to remind herself that this was not the time for a critique.
Death stood over Mort with a sword in one hand, and Mort's lifetimer in the other. YOU DON'T KNOW HOW SORRY THIS MAKES ME.
"I might," said Mort.
Death looked up... and straight at Susan. His eye sockets flared blue for a moment. He looked back at Mort, and then at Ysabell, then back at Susan, and finally back at Mort. And then he laughed.
He turned the hourglass over.
When he snapped his bony fingers, Mort and Ysabell both vanished. The room became as quiet as a room full of falling sand could become. Death very carefully placed the hourglass on a table, and then looked up at the ceiling for a moment.
YOU'D BETTER COME OUT.
Susan did. After having so many expectations of Death's house dashed, she hadn't expected... her grandfather to be exactly what she would have thought. He was seven feet tall, but looked taller. He was a skeleton dressed in a black hooded robe, just as Death should be. Susan had vague memories of a figure carries her on its shoulders through the huge dark rooms, but in memory it had been a human figure- bony, but human in a way she was certain of but couldn't quite define.
WELL, WELL, WELL. YOU HAVE A LOT OF YOUR MOTHER ABOUT YOU, said Death. AND YOUR FATHER.
"How do you know who I am?" asked Susan.
I HAVE A UNIQUE MEMORY.
"How can you remember me? I haven't even been conceived yet!"
I DID SAY UNIQUE. YOUR NAME IS...
"Susan, but..."
SUSAN? Death sounded bitter. THEY REALLY WANTED TO MAKE SURE, DIDN'T THEY? He sat in his chair and steepled his fingers, looking at Susan over them.
She looked right back.
TELL ME. WAS I... WILL I BE... AM I A GOOD GRANDFATHER?
That was an unexpected question, and one Susan didn't know that she could answer. "If I tell you, won't that be a paradox?"
NOT FOR US.
"Well... you've got bony knees."
Death stared at her. BONY KNEES?
"Sorry."
YOU CAME HERE TO TELL ME THAT?
"You've gone missing back... there," explained Susan. "I'm having to do the Duty. Albert is very worried. I came here to... find things out. I didn't know my father worked for you." Of course her parents had never told her any of that.
HE WAS VERY BAD AT IT.
"What have you done with him?"
THEY'RE SAFE FOR NOW. I'M GLAD IT'S OVER. HAVING PEOPLE AROUND WAS BEGINNING TO AFFECT MY JUDGMENT. SO, I HAVE GONE MISSING. AND YOU BELIEVE YOU HAVE INHERITED THE FAMILY BUSINESS. YOU?
"I didn't want to! The horse and the rat just turned up!" she protested.
RAT?
"Er... I think that's something that's going to happen," said Susan.
OH, YES. I REMEMBER. HMM. A HUMAN DOING MY JOB? TECHNICALLY POSSIBLE, OF COURSE, BUT WHY?
"I think Albert knows something, but he changes the subject."
Death nodded vaguely, but neither confirmed nor denied this. WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT CATS?
"Sorry?"
CATS. DO YOU LIKE 'EM?
"They're..." That was a question Susan had never had to think about. "They're all right. But a cat's just a cat."
CHOCOLATE, said Death. DO YOU LIKE CHOCOLATE?
"I think it's possible to have too much," she said.
YOU CERTAINLY DON'T TAKE AFTER YSABELL. AND YOUR MEMORY? YOU HAVE A GOOD MEMORY?
"Oh, yes. I... remember things. About how to be Death. About how it's all supposed to work. Look, just then you said you remembered about the rat, and it hasn't even happ-"
Death stood. MORPHIC RESONANCE. DAMN. PEOPLE DON'T BEGIN TO UNDERSTAND IT. SOUL HARMONICS. IT'S RESPONSIBLE FOR SO MANY THINGS.
Susan pulled out Imp's lifetimer. Blue smoke was still pouring through it. "Can you help me with this?"
I NEVER SHOULD HAVE ADOPTED YOUR MOTHER.
"Why did you?" wondered Susan.
Death shrugged. WHAT'S THAT YOU'VE GOT THERE? He reached for the lifetimer and held it up. AH. INTERESTING.
"Do you know what it means, granddad?"
I'VE NOT COME ACROSS IT BEFORE, BUT I SUPPOSE IT'S POSSIBLE. IN CIRCUMSTANCES. IT MEANS... SOMEHOW... THAT HE HAS RHYTHM IN HIS SOUL... GRANDDAD?
"Oh, no. That can't be right," said Susan. "That's just a figure of speech. And what's wrong with granddad?"
GRANDFATHER I CAN LIVE WITH. GRANDDAD? ONE STEP AWAY FROM GRAMPS, IN MY OPINION. ANYWAY, I THOUGHT YOU BELIEVED IN LOGIC. CALLING SOMETHING A FIGURE OF SPEECH DOESN'T MEAN IT'S NOT TRUE. FOR EXAMPLE MANY THINGS ARE BETTER THAN A POKE IN THE EYE WITH A BLUNT STICK. I'VE NEVER UNDERSTOOD THE PHRASE. SURELY A SHARP STICK WOULD BE EVEN WORSE-
He stopped.
I'M DOING IT AGAIN! WHY SHOULD I CARE WHAT THE WRETCHED PHRASE MEANS? OR WHAT YOU CALL ME? UNIMPORTANT! GETTING ENTANGLED WITH HUMANS CLOUDS THE THINKING. TAKE IT FROM ME. DON'T GET INVOLVED.
"But I am a human," said Susan.
I DIDN'T SAY IT WAS GOING TO BE EASY, DID I? DON'T THINK ABOUT IT. DON'T FEEL.
Susan decided she didn't really like what he had to say. "You're an expert, are you?"
I MAY HAVE ALLOWED MYSELF SOME FLICKER OF EMOTION IN THE RECENT PAST, said Death. BUT I CAN GIVE IT UP ANY TIME I LIKE.
He held up the hourglass again.
IT'S AN INTERESTING FACT THAT MUSIC, BEING OF ITS NATURE IMMORTAL, CAN SOMETIMES PROLONG THE LIFE OF THOSE INTIMATELY ASSOCIATED WITH IT. I'VE NOTICED THAT FAMOUS COMPOSERS IN PARTICULAR HANG ON FOR A LONG TIME. DEAF AS POSTS, MOST OF THEM, WHEN I COME CALLING. I EXPECT SOME GOD SOMEWHERE FINDS THAT VERY AMUSING. IT'S THEIR KIND OF JOKE.
He set the hourglass down and twanged it with a bony finger. It went whauuummmmeeee-chida-chida-chida.
HE HAS NO LIFE. HE HAS MUSIC.
"Music's taken him over?"
YOU COULD PUT IT LIKE THAT.
"Making his life longer?"
LIFE IS EXTENSIBLE. IT HAPPENS ALL THE TIME AMONG HUMANS. NOT OFTEN. USUALLY TRAGICALLY, IN A THEATRICAL KIND OF WAY. BUT THIS ISN'T ANOTHER HUMAN. THIS IS MUSIC.
"He played something," said Susan, "on some sort of stringed instrument like a guitar-"
Death turned. INDEED? WELL, WELL, WELL.
"Is that important?"
IT IS... INTERESTING.
"Is it something I should know?" Susan pressed.
IT IS NOTHING IMPORTANT. A PIECE OF MYTHOLOGICAL DEBRIS. MATTERS WILL RESOLVE THEMSELVES. YOU MAY DEPEND ON IT.
Susan shook her head. "What do you mean, resolve themselves?"
HE WILL PROBABLY BE DEAD IN A MATTER OF DAYS.
She stared at the lifetimer, still unable to read what the blue might mean. "But that's dreadful!"
WHY SHOULD YOU CARE?
"Because he's a human being, that's why," said Susan, surprised at herself. "I don't see why people should be messed around with like that. That's all. Oh, I don't know."
Death leaned down until his skull was almost touching her face. BUT MOST PEOPLE ARE RATHER STUPID AND WASTE THEIR LIVES. HAVE YOU NOT SEEN THAT? HAVE YOU NOT LOOKED DOWN FROM THE HORSE AT A CITY AND THOUGHT HOW MUCH IT RESEMBLED AN ANT HEAP, FULL OF BLIND CREATURES WHO THINK THEIR MUNDANE LITTLE WORLD IS REAL? YOU SEE THE LIGHTED WINDOWS AND WHAT YOU WANT TO THINK IS THAT THERE MUST BE MANY INTERESTING STORIES BEHIND THEM, BUT WHAT YOU KNOW IS THAT REALLY THERE ARE DULL, DULL SOULS, MERE CONSUMERS OF FOOD, WHO THINK THEIR INSTINCTS ARE EMOTIONS AND THEIR TINY LIVES OF MORE ACCOUNT THAN A WHISPER OF WIND.
The blue glow in his eye sockets was bottomless. It seemed to be sucking her thoughts out of her mind. "No," whispered Susan. "No, I've never thought like that."
Death stood up abruptly and turned away. YOU MAY FIND THAT IT HELPS.
"But it's all just chaos," said Susan. "There's no sense to the way people die. There's no justice!"
HAH.
"You took a hand," she told him. "You just saved my father."
I WAS FOOLISH. TO CHANGE THE FATE OF ONE INDIVIDUAL IS TO CHANGE THE WORLD. I REMEMBER THAT. SO SHOULD YOU.
"I don't see why we shouldn't change things to make the world better," insisted Susan.
HAH.
"Are you too scared to change the world?"
That might have been the wrong thing to say. Death turned to her, and his expression made her look away. He advanced slowly toward her. His voice, when it came, was a hiss.
YOU SAY THAT TO ME? YOU STAND THERE IN YOUR PRETTY DRESS AND SAY THAT TO ME? YOU PRATTLE ON ABOUT CHANGING THE WORLD? COULD YOU FIND THE COURAGE TO ACCEPT IT? TO KNOW WHAT MUST BE DONE AND DO IT, WHATEVER THE COST? IS THERE ONE HUMAN ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD WHO KNOWS WHAT DUTY MEANS? I SAID YOU MUST REMEMBER... FOR US, TIME IS ONLY A PLACE. IT'S ALL SPREAD OUT. THERE IS WHAT IS, AND WHAT WILL BE. IF YOU CHANGE THAT, YOU CARRY THE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE CHANGE. AND THAT IS TOO HEAVY TO BEAR.
Susan glared. "That's just an excuse!"
When he didn't answer immediately, she decided she'd had quite enough. She turned and marched out of the room.
SUSAN?
She stopped halfway across the floor, but didn't turn around. "Yes?"
REALLY... BONY KNEES?
"Yes!"
[NFB, NFI. Dialogue and a couple bits taken from Soul Music by Terry Pratchett]
The duty had begun to change the way Susan looked at things. It made her angry. At the same time, it made a strange sort of sense. Well, except for the parts that were stupid, like not interfering when you really should. It had also begun to change the way she looked at herself. First off, her name was all wrong. No one named Susan should be ushering anyone into the afterlife, whatever that afterlife might be. That job belonged to someone with just a better name, perhaps one with an X in it.
Her clothes were wrong, too. She'd worn the traditional black robe earlier, but it didn't seem to fit. She had the same dress she'd been wearing, but it was.... fine. It befitted someone named Susan. She wasn't even about to try any one of her mother's pink clothing monstrosities.
"Hold on," she said to her reflection. "I can create things, can't I?"
She tested it first. All she had to do was think of a cup, and a cup appeared. True, it had a skull and crossbones pattern on it, but there was only so much she could do.
"Well then," she said. "I don't want something soppy and posey. No silly black lace or anything worn by idiots who write poetry in their rooms and dress like vampires and are vegetarians really."
Clothes sort of fell onto her reflection. Black, of course. It was practical and fairly simple. "Well, maybe a bit of lace," she decided, making alterations. "And... perhaps a bit more... bodice."
As the alterations made themselves, Susan nodded into the mirror. It didn't look like anything a Susan would wear, but it looked right for her, and right for what she was doing.
"It's a good thing you're here," Susan told her reflection, "or I'd go totally mad."
*****
After playing dress-up with herself, she'd gone to the stables and found Binky. She saddled him, mounted, and once he'd taken her to the cornfield- don't ask her why there was a cornfield- she whispered, "I don't know how you do this. But you must be able to do it, and you know where I want to go."
Binky appeared to nod. He trotted forward, and then picked up speed, and the sky flickered, just once.
It felt sort of anticlimactic, especially when Susan saw that despite just traveling back in time nearly seventeen years, everything mostly looked the same. The cornfields were gone. Those had apparently been a new and very confusing addition. And, well, Binky was in the stables.
Susan dismounted and led him to the empty stall next to himself. "I'm sure you two know each other," she said helpfully before going into the house.
She found him in the room with the lifetimers. There was no mistaking his voice, even if she entered by creeping along the shelves so that no one noticed her. When she reached the end of the shelves, she saw Death standing over the redheaded boy who would one day be her father. There were red marks on his cheek, like burns, after Death had slapped him.
Susan raised her hand to the pale lines on her own cheek. It wasn't supposed to work that way. She shouldn't have that mark...
Her mother stood pressed against a pillar. She'd been a heavier girl, black hair with a white streak, the inverse of Susan's, and 100% more manageable. Her fashion sense had improved, too. Susan had to remind herself that this was not the time for a critique.
Death stood over Mort with a sword in one hand, and Mort's lifetimer in the other. YOU DON'T KNOW HOW SORRY THIS MAKES ME.
"I might," said Mort.
Death looked up... and straight at Susan. His eye sockets flared blue for a moment. He looked back at Mort, and then at Ysabell, then back at Susan, and finally back at Mort. And then he laughed.
He turned the hourglass over.
When he snapped his bony fingers, Mort and Ysabell both vanished. The room became as quiet as a room full of falling sand could become. Death very carefully placed the hourglass on a table, and then looked up at the ceiling for a moment.
YOU'D BETTER COME OUT.
Susan did. After having so many expectations of Death's house dashed, she hadn't expected... her grandfather to be exactly what she would have thought. He was seven feet tall, but looked taller. He was a skeleton dressed in a black hooded robe, just as Death should be. Susan had vague memories of a figure carries her on its shoulders through the huge dark rooms, but in memory it had been a human figure- bony, but human in a way she was certain of but couldn't quite define.
WELL, WELL, WELL. YOU HAVE A LOT OF YOUR MOTHER ABOUT YOU, said Death. AND YOUR FATHER.
"How do you know who I am?" asked Susan.
I HAVE A UNIQUE MEMORY.
"How can you remember me? I haven't even been conceived yet!"
I DID SAY UNIQUE. YOUR NAME IS...
"Susan, but..."
SUSAN? Death sounded bitter. THEY REALLY WANTED TO MAKE SURE, DIDN'T THEY? He sat in his chair and steepled his fingers, looking at Susan over them.
She looked right back.
TELL ME. WAS I... WILL I BE... AM I A GOOD GRANDFATHER?
That was an unexpected question, and one Susan didn't know that she could answer. "If I tell you, won't that be a paradox?"
NOT FOR US.
"Well... you've got bony knees."
Death stared at her. BONY KNEES?
"Sorry."
YOU CAME HERE TO TELL ME THAT?
"You've gone missing back... there," explained Susan. "I'm having to do the Duty. Albert is very worried. I came here to... find things out. I didn't know my father worked for you." Of course her parents had never told her any of that.
HE WAS VERY BAD AT IT.
"What have you done with him?"
THEY'RE SAFE FOR NOW. I'M GLAD IT'S OVER. HAVING PEOPLE AROUND WAS BEGINNING TO AFFECT MY JUDGMENT. SO, I HAVE GONE MISSING. AND YOU BELIEVE YOU HAVE INHERITED THE FAMILY BUSINESS. YOU?
"I didn't want to! The horse and the rat just turned up!" she protested.
RAT?
"Er... I think that's something that's going to happen," said Susan.
OH, YES. I REMEMBER. HMM. A HUMAN DOING MY JOB? TECHNICALLY POSSIBLE, OF COURSE, BUT WHY?
"I think Albert knows something, but he changes the subject."
Death nodded vaguely, but neither confirmed nor denied this. WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT CATS?
"Sorry?"
CATS. DO YOU LIKE 'EM?
"They're..." That was a question Susan had never had to think about. "They're all right. But a cat's just a cat."
CHOCOLATE, said Death. DO YOU LIKE CHOCOLATE?
"I think it's possible to have too much," she said.
YOU CERTAINLY DON'T TAKE AFTER YSABELL. AND YOUR MEMORY? YOU HAVE A GOOD MEMORY?
"Oh, yes. I... remember things. About how to be Death. About how it's all supposed to work. Look, just then you said you remembered about the rat, and it hasn't even happ-"
Death stood. MORPHIC RESONANCE. DAMN. PEOPLE DON'T BEGIN TO UNDERSTAND IT. SOUL HARMONICS. IT'S RESPONSIBLE FOR SO MANY THINGS.
Susan pulled out Imp's lifetimer. Blue smoke was still pouring through it. "Can you help me with this?"
I NEVER SHOULD HAVE ADOPTED YOUR MOTHER.
"Why did you?" wondered Susan.
Death shrugged. WHAT'S THAT YOU'VE GOT THERE? He reached for the lifetimer and held it up. AH. INTERESTING.
"Do you know what it means, granddad?"
I'VE NOT COME ACROSS IT BEFORE, BUT I SUPPOSE IT'S POSSIBLE. IN CIRCUMSTANCES. IT MEANS... SOMEHOW... THAT HE HAS RHYTHM IN HIS SOUL... GRANDDAD?
"Oh, no. That can't be right," said Susan. "That's just a figure of speech. And what's wrong with granddad?"
GRANDFATHER I CAN LIVE WITH. GRANDDAD? ONE STEP AWAY FROM GRAMPS, IN MY OPINION. ANYWAY, I THOUGHT YOU BELIEVED IN LOGIC. CALLING SOMETHING A FIGURE OF SPEECH DOESN'T MEAN IT'S NOT TRUE. FOR EXAMPLE MANY THINGS ARE BETTER THAN A POKE IN THE EYE WITH A BLUNT STICK. I'VE NEVER UNDERSTOOD THE PHRASE. SURELY A SHARP STICK WOULD BE EVEN WORSE-
He stopped.
I'M DOING IT AGAIN! WHY SHOULD I CARE WHAT THE WRETCHED PHRASE MEANS? OR WHAT YOU CALL ME? UNIMPORTANT! GETTING ENTANGLED WITH HUMANS CLOUDS THE THINKING. TAKE IT FROM ME. DON'T GET INVOLVED.
"But I am a human," said Susan.
I DIDN'T SAY IT WAS GOING TO BE EASY, DID I? DON'T THINK ABOUT IT. DON'T FEEL.
Susan decided she didn't really like what he had to say. "You're an expert, are you?"
I MAY HAVE ALLOWED MYSELF SOME FLICKER OF EMOTION IN THE RECENT PAST, said Death. BUT I CAN GIVE IT UP ANY TIME I LIKE.
He held up the hourglass again.
IT'S AN INTERESTING FACT THAT MUSIC, BEING OF ITS NATURE IMMORTAL, CAN SOMETIMES PROLONG THE LIFE OF THOSE INTIMATELY ASSOCIATED WITH IT. I'VE NOTICED THAT FAMOUS COMPOSERS IN PARTICULAR HANG ON FOR A LONG TIME. DEAF AS POSTS, MOST OF THEM, WHEN I COME CALLING. I EXPECT SOME GOD SOMEWHERE FINDS THAT VERY AMUSING. IT'S THEIR KIND OF JOKE.
He set the hourglass down and twanged it with a bony finger. It went whauuummmmeeee-chida-chida-chida.
HE HAS NO LIFE. HE HAS MUSIC.
"Music's taken him over?"
YOU COULD PUT IT LIKE THAT.
"Making his life longer?"
LIFE IS EXTENSIBLE. IT HAPPENS ALL THE TIME AMONG HUMANS. NOT OFTEN. USUALLY TRAGICALLY, IN A THEATRICAL KIND OF WAY. BUT THIS ISN'T ANOTHER HUMAN. THIS IS MUSIC.
"He played something," said Susan, "on some sort of stringed instrument like a guitar-"
Death turned. INDEED? WELL, WELL, WELL.
"Is that important?"
IT IS... INTERESTING.
"Is it something I should know?" Susan pressed.
IT IS NOTHING IMPORTANT. A PIECE OF MYTHOLOGICAL DEBRIS. MATTERS WILL RESOLVE THEMSELVES. YOU MAY DEPEND ON IT.
Susan shook her head. "What do you mean, resolve themselves?"
HE WILL PROBABLY BE DEAD IN A MATTER OF DAYS.
She stared at the lifetimer, still unable to read what the blue might mean. "But that's dreadful!"
WHY SHOULD YOU CARE?
"Because he's a human being, that's why," said Susan, surprised at herself. "I don't see why people should be messed around with like that. That's all. Oh, I don't know."
Death leaned down until his skull was almost touching her face. BUT MOST PEOPLE ARE RATHER STUPID AND WASTE THEIR LIVES. HAVE YOU NOT SEEN THAT? HAVE YOU NOT LOOKED DOWN FROM THE HORSE AT A CITY AND THOUGHT HOW MUCH IT RESEMBLED AN ANT HEAP, FULL OF BLIND CREATURES WHO THINK THEIR MUNDANE LITTLE WORLD IS REAL? YOU SEE THE LIGHTED WINDOWS AND WHAT YOU WANT TO THINK IS THAT THERE MUST BE MANY INTERESTING STORIES BEHIND THEM, BUT WHAT YOU KNOW IS THAT REALLY THERE ARE DULL, DULL SOULS, MERE CONSUMERS OF FOOD, WHO THINK THEIR INSTINCTS ARE EMOTIONS AND THEIR TINY LIVES OF MORE ACCOUNT THAN A WHISPER OF WIND.
The blue glow in his eye sockets was bottomless. It seemed to be sucking her thoughts out of her mind. "No," whispered Susan. "No, I've never thought like that."
Death stood up abruptly and turned away. YOU MAY FIND THAT IT HELPS.
"But it's all just chaos," said Susan. "There's no sense to the way people die. There's no justice!"
HAH.
"You took a hand," she told him. "You just saved my father."
I WAS FOOLISH. TO CHANGE THE FATE OF ONE INDIVIDUAL IS TO CHANGE THE WORLD. I REMEMBER THAT. SO SHOULD YOU.
"I don't see why we shouldn't change things to make the world better," insisted Susan.
HAH.
"Are you too scared to change the world?"
That might have been the wrong thing to say. Death turned to her, and his expression made her look away. He advanced slowly toward her. His voice, when it came, was a hiss.
YOU SAY THAT TO ME? YOU STAND THERE IN YOUR PRETTY DRESS AND SAY THAT TO ME? YOU PRATTLE ON ABOUT CHANGING THE WORLD? COULD YOU FIND THE COURAGE TO ACCEPT IT? TO KNOW WHAT MUST BE DONE AND DO IT, WHATEVER THE COST? IS THERE ONE HUMAN ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD WHO KNOWS WHAT DUTY MEANS? I SAID YOU MUST REMEMBER... FOR US, TIME IS ONLY A PLACE. IT'S ALL SPREAD OUT. THERE IS WHAT IS, AND WHAT WILL BE. IF YOU CHANGE THAT, YOU CARRY THE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE CHANGE. AND THAT IS TOO HEAVY TO BEAR.
Susan glared. "That's just an excuse!"
When he didn't answer immediately, she decided she'd had quite enough. She turned and marched out of the room.
SUSAN?
She stopped halfway across the floor, but didn't turn around. "Yes?"
REALLY... BONY KNEES?
"Yes!"
[NFB, NFI. Dialogue and a couple bits taken from Soul Music by Terry Pratchett]