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Deathbed	By : MadameManga Category: WWF/WWE > General Views: 2323 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. I do not know the celebrities of WWE/WWF. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 13
- 14
- 15
This story is very loosely inspired by the plot of the opera “The Flying Dutchman”. I’ve cast a number of familiar people in the roles; they are not intended to be seen as their real selves, but as actors playing parts. All recognizable characters are the property of WWE, and no infringement is intended. This story is intended for entertainment purposes only.
Written in 2001.
Deathbed

by Madame Manga
Some undeterminable time later, the Firebird returned. The family hadn’t left the house; no lights were visible in the windows. My father and the Mexican priest huddled on the ground next to the Range Rover, heads in hands or faces lowered to their knees. Neither of them had said a word in a long time, either to each other or to us.
Deadman and I sat in the yard, I on his lap with his arms around me. He had fetched his coat and wrapped it around both of us to keep us warm, for in the hours before dawn the night had grown cold. We weren’t speaking or kissing; we only sat quietly, gazing up at the stars. They glittered white, far above us, and all I felt, for the first time in my life, was peace.
Deadman’s hand smoothed my hair away from my face and I rested my head on his breast. Still I felt no heartbeat, and I wondered vaguely what his release from servitude would mean to his undead nature.
Aitch’s headlights came up the drive and he stopped the car behind the Range Rover with an abrupt screech of brakes as if he were afraid to pass it or startled that we were still there. I could hear his agonized breathing when he got out, leaving the keys in the ignition to provide for a quick getaway.
“Where’s my wife?” he said with an attempt at belligerence.
“Right where ya ran off an’ left her,” said Deadman with amusement. “What, he wouldn’t come back for another shot?”
Aitch moaned; it was almost a sob. “How’d you do it? She hated you!”
“Afraid you got that one wrong, sport,” replied my lover, breathing in my ear. “Guess you ain’t too well versed in the minds o' women.”
Aitch let out another moan. “What are you gonna do to us?”
“I ain’t even thinkin’ about you,” said Deadman. “I got better things to do.” He leaned down and kissed me.
“Ah, get a room,” snapped Aitch, apparently emboldened, and went swiftly up the drive and into the house. My father finally roused himself, his face pale, and stood up leaning on his car.
“Honey?” he said in a faint voice. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, Papa. Are you feeling better?”
“What was that? Why did you tell him that? I felt…something. It knocked the wind out of me.”
“I know, Papa. It was a condition he had to fulfill, to be released. Obviously the words had a lot of power.”
“What?” he said, uncomprehending.
“You asked me what I was,” I said to Deadman. He looked down at me. “I’m not really sure…but I don’t think the Devil raised me from the dead with black magic.”
“I kinda got that notion, darlin’,” he said with a smile.
“So what am I? What are you?”
Deadman stretched out a hand and looked at it. “I don’t feel so different. ‘Sides the obvious, that is.” The burns he had taken remained on his palm.
“I understand…you’re free, but you aren’t transformed. What happens now? Are you going to exist as undead forever?”
“I don’t know, darlin’.” He kissed the top of my head. “That might depend on you.”
“I said I’d be faithful to you until death, and it was the truth.” I reached up and stroked his cheek. “But how could I say that and have it mean what it meant, unless I’m alive?”
“You got a point there.” Deadman checked my throat pulse. “You sure seem alive to me, and you could handle those cartridges with no problem. That fat asshole never said flat out you were undead—that was me. I think there’s somethin’ else goin’ on here.”
“You must be right. Papa said my car was a mess and there was blood all over…Papa?” I stood up with Deadman and went over to my father, giving him a kiss.
“Honey?” He had helped the groggy priest to his feet and was straightening his clothes.
“Show me your crucifix, please.”
“Of course, honey.” He pulled the chain out of his shirt, the little gold cross and silver Christ tinkling against the gold ring that hung on the same chain, my mother’s wedding band. I took the crucifix in my hand and kissed it, warm from Papa’s body. “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.” Papa put a blessing hand on my head and made a cross on my forehead with his thumb.
“There. You see? I can’t be undead. There’s nothing of the Devil in me; I’d know it.”
“Yeah,” said Deadman, nodding. “So maybe he was lyin’ about the accident.”
“No, I don’t think he was. Not about my being killed. Just letting us make assumptions about the manner of my restoration. After all—”
“What?” said Papa. “Honey, you are making no sense. You’re wandering. Ah have to get you to a hospital.”
“I did have a job to do, and so I couldn’t be allowed to end there. The way things have turned out, it’s obvious whose purposes I had to achieve. You’re redeemed from Hell, and I…”
I sighed quietly, biting my lips. “I have a great deal to be forgiven, if I’m ever to be saved. I can’t atone for what I’ve done—nothing but grace will take away my sins. But…perhaps, I’ve been given a wonderful grace already.”
Deadman’s forehead creased, comprehension dawning. “Pop said yer car was all smashed up. But you didn’t see it that way, and neither did I.”
“No. Your life was saved twice by the Devil, and the way he did it nearly drove you insane. My life was restored…by the Creator of all life. I saw an all-pervading flash of light. A tiny glimpse of ultimate power.” A joyous sob caught in my throat. “It wasn’t traumatic, and it wasn’t meant to be. So I didn’t see that my car was wrecked and that my blood was everywhere, and since you and I were there together, you didn’t see it either.”
“But I could smell it on ya, darlin’. That’s why you smelled of death so strong.” He glanced at my father, who looked uneasy. “Don’t you worry, Pop. Sounds like she’s been in the best of hands all along.”
“Yes.” I raised my face to the dark sky, the stars twinkling coldly down at us. “I’m alive. Truly alive. But for a moment I was dead, and I was sent back. It wasn’t time for me to die.” I crossed myself, tears blurring the stars, and folded my hands. “Thank you. Thank you for giving me another chance at redemption.” God was merciful…and God was also just. What would I know of God in the end?
“You got a new life,” said Deadman in wonderment. “A real life.”
“And a new name. I christened myself. You see?”
“Yeah, I think I do. Want to celebrate?” He didn’t wait for my answer, but turned to the priest. “Yo, Padre. You got the stuff to do a marriage?”
“Que?” he said, apparently shocked into his native language.
“A marriage, Padre. A weddin’. Can you get us hitched?” He mimed putting a ring on my finger.
“Matrimonio?”
“Yeah, matrimony. Right here and now. I want to marry this woman. Irene?”
“I will,” I said without hesitation. “I’ll marry you.”
Deadman leaned down to kiss me, but my father’s furious objection halted him. “You’re insane,” said Papa. “You can’t marry my daughter!”
“Says who?” said Deadman.
“Papa, please—”
“Ah will not allow this, you insolent hoodlum,” said Papa. “You don’t have my consent to this!”
“Papa, I’m thirty years old and I’ve been married before. We don’t have to have your consent!”
“Honey, this man’s done something to you. Drugged you!” He grabbed me by the hand. “Come with me. We’ll get you to a hospital so you can press rape charges against him.”
“Madre de Dios…” muttered the priest.
“You mind pipin’ down, Pop?” said Deadman with a cold glare.
“I’m not going to do anything of the kind, Papa. Weren’t you listening? Leave me alone!” I pulled away from him and backed into Deadman’s arms. “I love him. Please believe me. I want to be his wife.”
“You met him yesterday! He isn’t even Catholic!” yelled Papa, his face turning red. “Roy had his little faults, sure, but he was a good Mass-going Roman Catholic!”
“I ain’t convertin’,” said Deadman with ironic humor. “I was always a true-blue Methodist.”
I rolled my eyes at the thought of a dead man changing his denomination, but before I could respond, I heard a sound of breaking window glass. Deadman and I were facing away from the house, a few yards from the Range Rover, and Papa and the priest stood with their backs against the car. Papa’s eyes opened wide and the brim of his hat went up. “Honey! Watch it!”
BKAM! A rifle spoke, and a round drilled itself into the side of the Range Rover inches from the priest’s hip. It wasn’t immediately clear to me who Aitch was aiming at, but if the .308 had gone about a foot and a half to the left and hit Deadman in the back, it would have gone clean through his body and mine as well with barely a loss of velocity.
The rider apparently had the same thought, for the next moment I found myself flying through the air as he vaulted over the car with me and pulled me down.
Shielding me, he growled deep in his chest. “Damn! Thought he was whipped!”
Papa and the priest scrambled around our side of the Range Rover in the next moment, the priest grey-faced under his natural tan and Papa sweating. “This is no shelter!” yelled Papa. “He’s firing high-powered rounds and they will go right through the car!”
He reached up and unlocked the rear door as another round shattered the rear side window. “Ah need my Remington!” BKAM! The windshield went out.
Papa jumped up immediately and grabbed the rifle from the rack, narrowly avoiding the next shot. BKAM! It tore through the broken window and the open door and buried itself in the earth six inches from my feet.”What is that maniac doing?!”
“I think he wants to kill us, Papa.”
“Ah got that! What Ah want to know is, why?” BKAM! A tire sank and Papa jammed in the Remington’s magazine and pulled back the bolt.
“I’m not sure he’s thought it over all that well!” I looked up at Deadman, who held me sideways with his body between me and the car, presenting as small a target as possible. “I think he’s just angry. Can we get to the bushes?” Between the car and the road was thick brush, but separated from us by about ten yards of open ground.
“Not real easy,” said Papa. “He’s firing from that upstairs window, so he’s got a high trajectory and a line of sight into almost the whole yard. But he hasn’t got auto-fire and he can’t aim at all of us at once, so if we make a dash—”
“Nix that,” said Deadman grimly. “There’s only one of us he’s really gunnin’ for.” He held me closer and Papa frowned. “You’re the one who messed it all up for him, darlin’. He knows he can’t kill me, so he’s gonna take you away from me if he can.”
“What?” said Papa. “What does he mean he can’t be killed?”
“Shoot the lights if ya can,” said Deadman. “He can’t see in the dark.” Papa looked at him for a moment, then angled the Remington over the hood of the Range Rover in preparation. BKAM—SPANNG! The sixth round hit a wheel and whined off.
“He’s reloading, Papa!” I said, but he had already jumped up and fired. BKAM! said the Remington in answer to the Winchester, and the front floodlight went out. Papa pulled back the bolt, fired again, and knocked out the one on the side of the house; the yard fell into darkness. Only the floodlight on the garage remained, but it cast little light this far out.
“Nice shootin’,” remarked Deadman. Papa didn’t reply, and quickly sat down again as Aitch skimmed a new round over his head. I heard him yell from the window, a stream of obscenities in a near-hysterical shriek. He emptied his rifle again as fast as he could shoot, bullets whacking and whining all around us.
The priest jumped out of the shelter of the car and tried to make a run for the bushes. Aitch’s last round drilled him through the lower leg and he fell, moaning in pain. Papa and I seized his feet and dragged him back again while Aitch reloaded.
Another bullet tore through the car door and hit Deadman in the back of the left arm, rocking him over so that he had to catch himself with his hands. I felt the shock reverberate in his body and reflexively grabbed the wound, his blood making a slippery spot on the leather coat.
“Ah, shit,” said Deadman, letting out a grunt of pain. “Even with the light out, his aim’s gettin’ better!” Aitch kept firing. “Feels like crouchin’ in a foxhole again. Damn, I hated the Army.”
“Are you all right?” I gasped, pulling down the shoulder of the coat to get a look at the wound. It was too dark now to see much, but my probing fingers found only a wet patch of skin. The hole had closed already.
“Yeah, it only smarts like hell, and that’ll pass.” My hands slid over another wet patch on his ribs—the bullet had gone into his body, but there didn’t seem to be an exit wound. Papa glanced over, his face nearly invisible in the starlight, but I knew his moods and I could tell he was angry at my solicitude towards the rider.
“Better bandage up the Padre—he’s losin’ blood.” Deadman offered me his bandanna and I took it and tied it tightly over the priest’s leg wound. As a field dressing it left something to be desired, but there was nothing else I could do at that moment.
“Ah’ll fire at the window next,” said Papa grimly. “When he reloads, Ah’ll wait for him to get up, and Ah’ll take the top of his head off.”
“Papa, that won’t kill him!” I said. “Not unless you use…” I looked under the car and thought I saw a dim glint in the dust, my eyes getting used to the darkness. The broken box of silver cartridges. “If I could get those for you, you could kill him.”
“If you could get what for me? Why on earth won’t a .308 do the job?” BKAM! said Aitch’s rifle.
“I don’t know how I can make this sound plausible, Papa, so I’m just going to have to tell you flat out. Aitch is undead, and so are all his family.” I decided not to mention that Deadman was in the same condition—my father already feared and resented him sufficiently. “Wounds from ordinary bullets will heal up in a few moments, but those cartridges out there have been blessed, and they will kill him.”
Papa said nothing.
I lay flat and tried to reach under the car; some of the cartridges had rolled here and there, but most of them were still in the box. My arms weren’t long enough to let me retrieve anything, though I pushed myself as far under the car as I could go, my face nearly touching the still-warm undercarriage.
“Oh, no—I can’t reach them!” Papa’s arms weren’t much longer than mine and the priest lay writhing in pain from his bullet wound—was I going to have to go out in front of the car where Aitch could see me plainly?
Deadman pulled me out and lay down on the ground himself. “I’ll get ‘em.”
“But you’ll be—”
“Never you mind that, darlin’.” He shoved himself under the car, his chest so deep he scraped his back on the undercarriage, and lunged forward.
“Nngghh!” he grunted, his fingers scratching in the dust, and when he touched the box he hissed and involuntarily snatched his hand back.
I smelled his burning flesh and bit my lips in sympathy, but he reached out again, scrabbling with the tips of his fingers, firmly seized the box and shoved it backwards under the car. I dove to retrieve it, and Deadman sat up, the fingers of his right hand curled and twisted with the burns.
“I gotta quit doin’ this,” he said, clutching his right hand in his left.
“Oh!” I said, nearly in tears. “How badly are you hurt?”
“I’d jump into a fire for you, darlin’ Irene.” He leaned over and kissed me on the lips. Papa let out a furious breath. “It’ll heal. Just takes a normal amount of time, y’know? Give the damn things to Pop, an’ let him fire away.”
I searched the box by touch and found four of the .308s, handing them to Papa. He ejected the round from the Remington’s chamber, popped his magazine and removed four rounds from the top, then put in the silver cartridges and replaced the magazine, pulling back the bolt to chamber the new round.
“Guess Ah’ll have to get him in four shots,” he said quietly. Apparently he was willing to go along with what I had said, though I didn’t think he actually believed me. “Honey, you have your revolver?”
“No, it’s out in the yard in my purse—I never picked it up.” I didn’t mention my reason—that Deadman could not touch me while I held it.
Papa sighed slightly, counted Aitch’s sixth round, and jumped up to fire again. BKAM! I had half expected that the handmade cartridges wouldn’t function properly—who knew how long their maker had held onto them? But Papa’s rifle bucked with a heavy recoil and the bullet struck the upper half of the window Aitch was using as a sniper’s nest.
“Ah missed—these rounds have a lot of powder in ‘em and it went a little high,” said Papa, breathing heavily as he ducked down again. Aitch’s rifle was silent. “Well, fiddlesticks!” This was as close as Papa ever got to swearing. “He’ll be waiting until Ah look up again, and take me out!”
“I’ll go out there to draw his fire,” said Deadman, getting up on his knees. “He can put all the damn bullets through me that he wants!” Papa seemed startled, but didn’t object; he yanked the bolt and got ready to fire, crouching at the back of the Range Rover. “Get set, Pop. Count of three. One, two—”
On three, Deadman rolled out from the shelter of the car and got to his feet, scrambling for the house. I lay flat and put a comforting hand on the priest’s back when he moaned. BKAM! That was Aitch’s rifle, and he was firing at my lover; I squeezed my eyes shut and prayed.
BKAM! answered the Remington as Papa stood and fired and pulled the bolt.
BBKKAAMM! The next two rounds went off almost simultaneously and Aitch’s bullet crashed through the car door just above me. I felt a searing blow to my shoulder and cried out.
BKAM! Once more Papa’s rifle discharged, the report ringing out into the dying echoes of the last volley, and from the house came a bloodcurdling yell and a woman's high-pitched scream.
“Honey?” Papa’s anxious voice as he fell to his knees beside me. “Are you hurt?”
“N-not much…” I put my hand to my shoulder and felt blood. “I think it only creased me.”
“Thank God.” Papa’s hands fumbled with my jacket.
“Where—ow!—where is ‘Taker?” I thought it unwise to refer to him as Deadman. “Was he shot?”
“Yes, Ah think he was,” said Papa with no audible emotion. “But Ah got that maniac in the window. Right through the brisket, if Ah don’t miss my guess.” Hysterical screams and shouts from the house seemed to confirm the statement. He tore a sleeve from his own shirt and bandaged my wound, then pulled my jacket over it again.
I heard nothing from the yard for a few tense moments—then a muffled curse and a scraping sound, and Deadman limped around the end of the car, dragging one leg.
“Busted the bone when it went through,” he remarked, and sat heavily down next to me. “But I think ya nailed him.” I felt the blood soaking the thigh of his jeans. “There we go.” Deadman straightened his knee and rubbed the spot where the bullet had torn into his flesh.
Someone flung the front door of the house open with a crash; someone else slammed it again and the voices rose higher. A downstairs window went up and an automatic cocked.
KRAK! KRAK! KRAK! The shots went wild or bounced off the car. “Nine-millimeter, I think,” said Papa. “Won’t do much.”
Deadman noticed that I was clutching my shoulder and trying to hold back whimpers of pain, and he turned to me.
“You OK, darlin’?”
I began to reply, the automatic fired again with a sharp report, and my entire field of vision lit up with a yellow-white glare. For a moment, I saw everything clear as day: my lover’s face with a startled expression, the priest’s shoes, the bare yard with shadows radiating across it as sharp as if they had been cut from black paper.
Then the shock wave hit, the car rocked towards me on its side wheels, and I was knocked into a backwards somersault and flat on my face.
Deadman landed on top of me, huddling me into a tight ball and covering me with his body. Through my closed lids I still saw the bright glare from the house. I hadn’t really heard the explosion—my ears were shocked into partial deafness by the blast, and the yells and moans around me were thick and dull.
What had that been? A bomb? Chunks of flaming wood began to fall all around us, Deadman flinching as they hit him. The priest’s clothes caught on fire and the car crashed down on four wheels again.
“Holy Mother!” shouted Papa, sounding as if he were a mile away. He rolled the priest over to put out his smouldering shirt and threw dirt on him to smother the flames. “They’ve blown the whole place to kingdom come!”
“Wasn’t on purpose!” said Deadman, sitting up and speaking close to my ear. “Smell that?”
“Gas?” I said.
“So that’s what the hell was wrong with the propane tank!” He laughed uproariously, his stomach shaking against my back. “Been leaking all day!”
I gasped, recalling the sloppy job Aitch had made of the valve adjustment. “Oh, no! They’re burning in there!” Jumping up, I leaned on the hood of the Range Rover and looked at the house. It wasn’t really there any more. Only a collapsed heap of blackened timber, the flames raging in the skeleton of the walls. The barn roof was on fire, as was the side wall of the garage. The whole place was a funeral pyre.
“That’ll take care of ‘em just as good as a silver bullet,” said Deadman with satisfaction. “It collected in the cellar first, I reckon, and the gun touched it off when it got high enough on the ground floor. Rough luck.”
He kept laughing. I sank to my knees and crossed myself, saying a silent prayer for their souls. I didn’t have much hope for any of them; perhaps there was a chance. But my skin began to crawl, my nostrils trying to close up against a dreadful smell, far worse than the gas or the burning house, which had started to take on a stink of roasted meat.
“What is that?” I quavered, reaching for Deadman. He put an arm around me and clamped me to his hip, putting the other hand on my head as we knelt side by side.
“Quiet,” he said. “Padre, if you kinda felt like prayin’, now would be a good time.” The stench intensified, clogging my throat and wrenching my stomach, and I clung to my lover, who breathed with short huffs through his mouth. Papa dropped his rifle, bent over and vomited. “Yeah, I know that smell. Funny how a smell brings back the memories.”
“Memories?” I choked, a hand over my nose.
“Did I say I felt like I was in a foxhole again?” Deadman grinned harshly, his red beard and hair glinting in the firelight. “I may have to introduce ya to an old acquaintance. Met him somewhere in Belgium, December of ‘44. There was a little altercation goin’ on in the woods at the time.”

Continued...
- 13
- 14
- 15
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Deathbed