Oliver’s day was weird.

Granted, the day before, he was driving his asshole daughter and pussy son to Canada to get his daughter into some education system, because apparently she needed one.

Then they entered this weird ass town and upon leaving got hit by a truck and somehow separated.

The day before was kind of weird in itself due to the accident, but today was a bit stranger.

First, he wakes up in a clinic with extreme pain in his eyes, then his doctor is apparently an old guy who may or may not be part of a cult involving wearing see-through bandages over the eyes, and said doctor was also friends with the undertaker of the town.

Oh, and as mentioned, Oliver had no idea where Stacy or Mike was.

So obviously, other than looking for a new method of transportation (to get them to Canada) and the law enforcement of the town (to sue whichever company that truck belonged to) Oliver also had to find his kids.

The Doctor, Van, was not really helpful, but according to him the undertaker of the town had no new dead bodies so at least they were alive…

That didn’t make it any easier for Oliver to find his kids, but he’d work with it.

Leaving the clinic, Oliver was walking along the mostly empty streets of the town, occasionally seeing someone shuffling along in the distance as said people would turn corners…

A really small population then.

“Damn this glare…” Oliver muttered to himself as he once more blinked, rubbing at his eyes which were in extreme pain every few minutes, those moments of pain were always punctuated with the brightness of the surroundings increasing to Oliver.

Maybe he got some minor brain damage from the accident? He hoped not, but with all this pain in his eyes he was almost jealous of Van for his bandages.

Walking past a guy exiting a shop (and ignoring the strange rotten smell from the guy) Oliver looked at the shop…

Uh, Undertaker more like it… huh, they really weren’t far from each other… looking back in the direction of the clinic, Oliver had to keep himself from rubbing his eyes once more…

The clinic looked way further than he recalled walking from… maybe the glare was messing with his depth perception too?

Hearing a bell, Oliver turned to look at the door of the undertakers parlour only to see a man in a dark red outfit, surgical gloves and mask on as he looked to Oliver.

“Huh… you don’t look like you need my services… so why are you in front of my shop?” the apparent owner, the Undertaker of the town, asked as Oliver blinked, rubbing his eyes as they began to pain once more…

For some reason Oliver thought the Undertaker was burnt for a moment, like skin-melting burnt… but after blinking and looking again, the Undertaker’s skin was pretty normal, as the man with strangely yellow eyes looked at Oliver…

“Nice contacts… uh, sorry, just, I wanted to ask if you’ve seen my kids. My daughter’s a teenager, almost an adult, and my son is still in elementary school.” Mike spoke after a moment of confusion on why his thoughts felt so blurry…

So light-headed…

“I believe I did see a girl… yes, I remember speaking to her about an hour or so ago, she was going to the Mayor’s office.” The Undertaker offered as he closed the door behind him, pulling out a cigarette.

Oliver just noticed, but this Undertaker smelt heavily of smoke, like a forest fire in a way.

“Thanks, we were in an accident yesterday and somehow got separated… is there a delivery company that works around this place?” Oliver asked, thinking about his own urge for a cigarette as he pulled out one for himself.

“Only one, and it’s not so much a company as it is one driver, the Deliverer is what his truck is called.” The Undertaker offered, allowing the ash at the end of the cigarette to fall to the floor as Oliver lit his own.

“Thanks, we got hit by that truck, and it was on the wrong side of the road… I’m thinking of suing.” Oliver admitted, not noticing the small smile on the Undertaker’s face at his words.

“Oh really? Well, I suppose it’s to be expected, the Sheriff doesn’t like that driver… oh, can I ask you to help me with something?” The Undertaker opened the door, once more allowing the sound of a bell to echo.

“Uh, sure, what is it?” Oliver asked, finishing his cigarette as he walked in…

Oliver had appearances to maintain, and if he was viewed as a nice guy, then it should be easier to get sympathy at court when he sued that delivery guy.

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“It’s just unloading some boxes, and one body that needs to be cremated… don’t worry, the body is in a bag, can’t smell or see it.” The Undertaker tried to calm Oliver down after seeing Oliver’s aversion to the idea of picking up a dead body.

“Oh… okay…” Oliver said, following the Undertaker to the boxes which needed to be packed around the shop, making small talk as they did so.

At first they spoke about cigarette brands, then it was about the town itself and then the bandages.

“So wait, there’s a cult in this town?” Oliver asked, packing the disinfectants into their cupboard.

“Well, we don’t call it that obviously, but the Church of the All Seeing God has quite a few people support it. The followers don’t force their beliefs on others, and help out a lot in town. I’m not one, but the Doctor is.” The Undertaker said as he packed some needles away.

“Oh yeah… he was wearing bandages… still, aren’t you all worried? There’s been lots of bad cults in the past, like ones that scam people, and one that committed mass suicide.”

That last one seemed to get the attention of the Undertaker as he looked to Oliver before looking at the flickering light on the ceiling.

“That sounds interesting… but no, the A.S.G Church isn’t that bad, and they only really have two rules. One, do not interfere in the matters of the town, and two, eyes are the windows to the soul and are to be protected.” The Undertaker’s strange smile widened a bit at seeing Oliver squeeze his eyes shut in sudden pain.

“Perhaps you should join, given that you’re losing your eyes.” Oliver blinked at the words, clearing his vision as he looked to the Undertaker.

“Sorry, what did you say?” Oliver asked, pretty sure that he heard wrong.

“I said you might want to join, given how you keep rubbing your eyes. If they hurt, maybe you should visit them, I’m certain they have opticians given their beliefs.” The Undertaker clarified and Oliver breathed a sigh, wondering why he heard differently…

After finally packing most of the boxes away, they finally moved to the cremation chamber, and seeing the zipped up body bag, Oliver wrinkled his nose in disgust.

“One hundred and sixty two, along with one thousand four hundred.” Oliver looked to the Undertaker as they both lifted the body, moving over towards the furnace.

“The first is the temperature at which human skin tissue is destroyed. The latter, is the temperature the furnace must maintain for around two hours to cremate the human body, though it is actually between one thousand four hundred and one thousand eight hundred.” They placed the back on to a slider, pushing it into the furnace, closing it as it began to burn.

“It’s fascinating to me. The human body is intricate and even how it handles temperature is strange, the skin tissue burns at a much lower temperature than bone for instance… I’ve always wondered…” looking to Oliver, the smile on the Undertaker’s face took on a notably manic appearance.

“How would a live human react to being cremated?” The Undertaker stepped closer, and Oliver stepped back instinctively.

That question… it was not rhetorical.

With a sudden lunge, the Undertaker charged at Oliver, who dove out of the way immediately, shouting in a combination of anger at fear at the situation.

Standing up as quickly as possible, Oliver saw the Undertaker turn, now holding a meat hook attached to a chain as he walked over, the Undertaker’s neck having spasms as his head twitched as he stepped closer, the grin still there… still too may teeth to be normal.

“Oh, don’t worry… I’m certain you’ll die within seconds, you’ll barely feel a thing… let me find the answer, how does it feel!” The Undertaker’s next attack was done with the meat hook as Oliver panicked.

When an animal is threatened with death, the brain instinctively goes into fight or flight mode… and Oliver’s decision had to be made.

Oliver, back in high school at least, was a football player, and while that was over a decade ago, he was still physically fit… and as a player of such a violent sport, Oliver was well versed in the art of brawling.

Brawling and fighting for your life was two very different things, but Oliver didn’t even have the time to wish he took a self-defence class or something as he charged forward.

Fight it was.

Surprised by the attack, the Undertaker coughed out a breath of air as Oliver’s shoulder struck his sternum, forcing the air out of the Undertaker’s lungs.

“Why, why won’t you accept the fire, accept the warmth?” the Undertaker’s words were beginning to make less and less sense, and at this point Oliver really didn’t want to deal with the psychotic person anymore…

Again, Oliver barely had a moment to think, he knew that from his current position the Undertaker could potentially hit him in the back with that meat hook, so he had to push off, make space between him and the mad person…

And that’s when Oliver noticed it… the slight glow of fire… the heat flowing through the opening in the furnace. There were more than one furnace, and one was still on a low setting…

And it was just a bit behind the Undertaker.

With renewed purpose, Oliver pushed forward, pulling his arms back from where they were hugged around the Undertaker so that his arms could be placed underneath the Undertaker’s arms, shaking the Undertaker as Oliver stepped forward.

“Stop this, I can teach you, you will enjoy it, the warm embrace of the fire, embrace it!” Still screaming, the Undertaker was pushed close enough for Oliver to shove the Undertaker into the open mouth of the furnace, quickly shutting and locking the thing while raising the temperature.

“Oh, oh, this is how it feels, so warm, so loved, it’s amazing!” Oliver could still hear the Undertaker, and looking into the furnace Oliver could see the Undertaker, still laughing as his skin began to bubble and boil, freaking out Oliver as the Undertaker finally stopped, no longer amongst the living…

A popping noise suddenly sounded, and Oliver was vomiting on the floor upon realizing that the source of the sound was the Undertaker’s eyes…

“What the fuck kind of town is this…” Oliver asked aloud as he fell backwards, sitting down as he took deep breaths… that’s when the realization of what just happened hit Oliver, that he had just killed someone.

It started as a heaving, shuddering breath, his heart beating irregularly and his pupils dilating, but Oliver began to undergo a panic attack as he lie on the ground in the Undertaker’s workshop…

It would be hours before he stood once more, trying to believe that there would be no consequences for his actions, that they were in self-defence and justified…

And once he did, Oliver would walk to the furnace, look at the burning body of the Undertaker, and adjust the temperature once more.

Leaving the shop, Oliver did not notice the lack of people in the streets, nor the fact that the sun had barely moved despite spending hours helping the Undertaker…

The first thing he would notice is that the Undertaker was right.

One thousand four hundred degrees Fahrenheit to cremate a body… one hundred and sixty two degrees to burn skin.

It was a fact that Oliver would forever be haunted by.