Marke opened his eyes to see a person sitting across from him at a very fancy office desk. The desk had darkly stained wood with bright white inlay showing the outline of a grinning face like a goblin smile emoji. The person was leaning back in a dark leather chair and looking at a piece of white paper. The person wore a dark suit and had dark hair and dark skin. Actually, Marke realized, the whole office is dark. He tried to look down at himself but only saw a dark padded chair. Odd. I had a body last time I checked.

The person put down the paper and turned their white eyes to Marke. “It’s true, you had a body. Then you died. Report says you were hit by a truck. Classic.” The person’s voice was… dark. I need a thesaurus. Thought Marke. Oh, I guess you are reading my thoughts. Makes sense. No mouth.

The Person nodded. “Yes. Well Mark, we ha-“ Marke. Marke Clarke. Marke interrupted. The person have a small sigh. Sorry. Please continue. Marke thought.

“Marke Clarke. On behalf of RealmZZ Inc (hereafter refered to as ‘RIZZ’), welcome to the afterlife interview. During your last life, RIZZ purchased your reincarnation mortgage as part of bulk asset acquisition. However, our underwriters are concerned that your mortgage doesn’t meet the RIZZ profitibility standards. Your lives have been mediocre, uninspiring, bland, small, -“ WOW. Marke interrupted again. The dark person continued without stopping. “- basic, and lacking advancement. If this trend were allowed to continue, the underwriters expect that you would be unable to pay an installment on your debt within five lifetimes. In the event that you fail to make a payment, RIZZ would call in the loan and file to garnish your reincarnation allotments. You would be obligated to reincarnate as a microbe for a cumulative lifespan of ten thousand years.”

Marke blanched. Or, he would have blanched, if he had a face with which to blanche. I don’t like that idea! Marke thought. The dark person tapped their fingers on the desk. The sound echoed around the room like the final echo of the outer door of the crypt. I’ve never even seen a crypt. Why would I know that? Marke asked not-aloud.

Dark person continued. “To avoid the loss of income to RIZZ from your lackluster lives, “ OUCH. Thought Marke. “RIZZ has authorized me, DEATH, to give you two options that might allow you to avoid ten thousand years (or approximately ninty billion reincarnations) as an insignificant spec. Would you like to hear the options?”

YES. Thought Marke. PLEASE YES.

“I thought you might. Be aware that either option could still result in the ‘microbe scenario’. Here is the first option.” DEATH waved a hand and a generic human person appeared. “Instead of taking a default reincarnation, you can increased your deathly payment amount by taking multiple negative attributes. For example: You could be unlucky. “ The human person suddenly had a black eye and a missing shoe. “You could be born a Virgo” The human person suddenly looked terribly sad. “You could be born as the second in a set of twins” The human person suddenly lost the other shoe and was cowering in the shadow of some larger person. “And you could be allergic to cheese.” The human person suddenly had tears running down their face as they gripped their stomach in one hand. The other hand shoved a block of cheese into the person’s mouth.

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OH NO! Marke cowered in fear from the terrible sight before him.

Death waved their hand again and the human person vanished. “There are a plentitude of negative attributes to pick from, but they would need to be equally serious to these four. The benefit to you is that adversity in life often leads to greater inspiration, or so I am told.”

What’s the other option? Marke tried to stop his mental voice from squeeking.

“The other option is for you to take on a contract with a subsidiary of RIZZ called ‘Quality Assurance: Realm Kit’ or ‘QuARK’. If you perform the work to a satisfactory level, your debt would be wiped out and you would continue on to the next reincarnation as a normal, unburdened soul.” DEATH stopped speaking and sat very still. Marke might have thought that DEATH looked like they were lying but trying not to look like they were lying, but Marke did not want DEATH to hear anything like that from him.

What sort of work would it be? Marke asked. QuARK makes it sound like they build universes or something.

“Not quite, but it’s related to that. You would be testing realms currently under development to make certain they meet a certain standard.” DEATH still showed awkward lying-not-lying body language.

Um. Can you tell me anything more? Marke was starting to smell something fishy.

“If you don’t like these options you can choose to reincarnate again and just cross your finders and hope that ‘This Time Will Be Different!’ RIZZ has already retained my services during this interview and your choice does not affect my compensation.” DEATH clasped their hands and placed them on the desk somewhat awkwardly, like they had forgotten what people do with hands while speaking.

Marke tried to ask another question, but DEATH interrupted. “Please make your choice now.”

Marke took a deep breath. Or he thought about taking a deep breath, which was close enough. Will there be cheese if I choose to work for QuARK?

DEATH hesitated, then spoke. “Yes. I imagine there will be cheese possible.”

Possible cheese is better than no cheese. I choose QuARK. Thank you. Marke thought about sticking out his hand to shake on it. Ha, shaking hands with death.

“Excellent choice, Marke Clarke. You may receive a brief survey later about your experience today, please fill that out so we can continuously improve our customer service experience. See you soon.” DEATH winked and waved his hand.