Blocked

Blocked
Word Count: 512
By Scott Wilson

The streets were blocked with emergency vehicles. Uniforms were everywhere, and escape seemed impossible...but was it? Desmond let go of the blind and scampered to his study, where he took his shotgun off the mantle above the fireplace.

“You’re not going to get me,” he mumbled as he loaded two shells.

A loud thud at the front of the house startled him and he also blew a hole in the roof when he jumped from the fright.

“Bastards,” he said. “Tryin’ to make me take myself out now?”

Desmond peered around the corner and saw four heavily armed police officers storm through the front door, which they had so kindly knocked down. He ducked across the hall and retrieved the large duffle bag he’d stashed under his bed. It was heavy, not in the Neil from the Young Ones Heavy, but rather completely stuffed with hundred dollar bills from the local Commonwealth Bank. They weren’t going to get the money if they caught him; he’d see to that by torching the duffle bag, and the rest of his house so there was no evidence they could pin on him.

Desmond heard the police mumbling away, they seemed to have stopped searching the house for him.

“You dumb pigs,” he said. “I’m going to get away with this, cool.”

“I’m sorry I’m a tad late,” a voice boomed behind Desmond.

Desmond turned around to face a tall skeletal figure in a white robe.

“Who...who are you?” Desmond said.

“Death!”

“What...?”

“I know, I’m a tad late and wearing the wrong colour,” Death said. “The dry cleaners botched my robe and I spent a good half hour trying to convince them that, white was not the new black.”

“I’m not dead, why are you here?”

“Oh, I’m afraid you are, Sir.” Death said. “If you care to take a look in your lounge room, I think you’ll see yourself, or rather, the body you used to live in...I love that line, live in, quite witty I think. Made that one up myself to, you know, to break the ice.”

Desmond cautiously walked to the lounge room and saw the officers standing around, what looked remarkably like his body, lying on the floor with an awkwardly positioned pen sticking out of his left ear.

“Whaa...”

“Apparently you were quite clumsy when you were working out your getaway plan.

Shouldn’t run with a pen behind your ear you know. These sorts of things tend to happen, you know, if you aren’t careful. They always used to warn you about running with scissors, but any sharp object will do the trick.”


Desmond looked at the duffle bag on his shoulder and turned to Death.

“Oh that,” Death said. “Another thing they got wrong, yes you can take it with you when you’re gone. But there’s not much call for money in the afterlife you know.

Except maybe for stoking the fire under you where you’re going.”

THE END