Late Night Departure

Eddie awoke with a jolt, not even aware he'd fallen asleep. He raked the drool off his cheek as he sat up, blinking groggily at his surroundings. That's when he knew something was definitely rotten in Denmark.

He had no idea where the heck he was.

The drab grey walls and highly polished tiled floors gave the cavernous room he woke up in an institutional feel. Rows upon rows of empty, dust-covered seats were on either side of him, sectioned off by the large, numbered signs hanging above them from the ceiling. To his left was an oversized digital screen, listing departure and arrival times next to a series of jumbled up numbers and letters. To his right was a wall of floor to ceiling windows, looking out over a pitch-black asphalt tarmac.

Eddie was in an airport. But why was he here? And how had he gotten here? Wherever "here" was?

With no better options available, Eddie got up and made his way over to the gleaming chrome podium below the huge, blinking screen. And, by extension, the only other person he saw in his immediate vicinity. At first glance, the capable young woman behind it seemed friendly and quite pleasant in her smart, cranberry red skirt suit and matching neckerchief. Her long, dark hair was pulled back in a neat bun, adding to her coifed, polished appearance. When Eddie drew closer, however, he realized the twenty-something woman - much like the airport he found himself in - was not exactly what she seemed.

Her smile, which at a distance seemed friendly and welcoming, made the fine hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. Something about it was just unnatural; maybe her bun was too tight, causing the skin of her face to be pulled back more than it should have been. Or maybe it was her eyes, which - despite the uncanny width of her smile - were blacker than pitch and completely lifeless. Whatever it was, Eddie immediately decided he didn't like this young woman one bit.

"Good evening, sir," she greeted, her tone obnoxiously chipper, as her unnaturally wide smile stretched even closer to her ears. "...and welcome. How may I help you?"

Eddie tore his gaze away from the off-putting young woman and glanced around the cold, empty terminal again. "I... I'm not sure," he admitted, his unease growing with every second, "Frankly, Young Lady, I don't even know what I'm doing here. The last thing I recall was..." he trailed off, punctuating his hanging sentence with a frustrated huff. It was no use: no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't remember anything about the last twenty-four hours of his life. Where he was before, what he was doing, who he was with; it was all a huge blank, like someone had cut a gaping hole in his memory.

"Something's not right," he muttered, rubbing his aching head, "I don't... I can't... how the hell did I even get here?! Where even is 'here'?!"

"None of that really matters, sir," the annoyingly cheerful young woman said, "you're here now; how you got here and where you were before is inconsequential. May I have your name, please?"

Shaking his head, Eddie just gave up. For now, maybe it was just best to play along, until he got to the bottom of all this. "Sure," he murmured, "It's, uh, Eddie."

"Your full name, sir."

Despite the wide smile frozen on her face, the young woman's tone was noticeably clipped. Eddie tried not to pay any attention to it, clearing his throat as he smoothed a hand over his thinning hair.

"Edward," he grumbled, wincing as he tasted the name his mother had given him, which he never really liked, "Edward George Morella."

Almost faster than his eyes could follow, the young woman's glossy red acrylic tipped fingers flew across the keyboard in front of her. For an unsettlingly long time, the soft, rhythmic clacking of those keys was the only noise echoing around the cavernous room. In a heartbeat, she suddenly stopped typing and locked her dead, blacker-than-black eyes on him again.

"Okie-dokie, Mr. Morella: you're all set," she announced, craning her neck to look over the counter by his feet, "do you have any luggage you'd like to check? If not, please have a seat and wait for your boarding time to be announced."

Eddie stood there with his jaw on the floor as she printed off a boarding pass on a slip of glossy paper, his wide eyes bouncing from it to her and back again. "W-Wait just a minute," he squawked, "I haven't booked any flights that I know of! I don't even like flying! What airline is this?! Where am I even going?! I want answers, lady!"

"I'm sorry, sir, but I'm not allowed to divulge such information," the young woman insisted, her tone crisp and slightly barbed as she spoke through her constantly grinning teeth. "Please take a seat; all your questions will be answered shortly... after you've boarded the flight. In the meantime, feel free to explore the duty-free shops and help yourself to a refreshment. Have a pleasant evening!"

Realizing he wasn't going to get any more from the snippy, freakishly grinning woman, Eddie just walked away with a heavy sigh. As he took a seat and studied his boarding pass more thoroughly, the less sense it made to him. All the letters were jumbled up, making it impossible to glean any useful information from it. Some of the letters didn't even look like English, or were printed backwards and upside-down.

Defeated, he folded up the pass and stuck it in his inside jacket pocket, then glanced up at the digital screen. The arrival and departure times changed so quickly, he hardly had time to read any of them. Not that it would have done him much good to try. Although there were plenty of time slots listed, all the destination lines were completely blank. All Eddie had to go by was a list of flight numbers, which was how he found his: Flight 404, departing at 12:01 a.m. to... only God knew where.

The clock hands on his wristwatch seemed to be frozen, so he checked the old-fashioned clock on the wall behind the smiling woman's head. According to it, it was barely nine p.m. A four-hour wait for a flight he hadn't booked and didn't know where would take him was absolutely ridiculous to Eddie. He was done with this nonsense, full stop. The only place he wanted to be right now was home, snuggled up in the comfort of his Barcalounger with a cigar and a nice glass of Chianti. With a determined harrumph, he tugged the wrinkles out of his sportcoat and marched off, looking for the nearest exit. Finding an exit, however, proved to be much more challenging than Eddie ever imagined.

There were plenty of exit signs posted all around the terminal, but all of them led to dead ends. Literally. Twice, he followed a blinking red sign that read "fire exit", and as soon as he turned the corner he smacked right into a brick wall. Before long, he was running up and down the terminal, trying every door he came across out of panic. The few doors that weren't locked held more stacked-up bricks on the other side of them. One opened to nothing but air, and a steep drop into a pit so dark, Eddie couldn't see the bottom of it.

Even though he was sure he took a different direction every time, Eddie always wound up back at that same gate without fail. No matter how far or fast he ran, he stumbled across that same chrome desk, with the same weird, grinning young woman standing behind it. Like he was going in a gigantic circle, stuck in a loop with no beginning and no end.

After trying to find an exit for what felt like hours, Eddie stopped to catch his breath and wipe the sweat from his brow. When he happened to look up at the clock on the wall, he couldn't believe his eyes. It was still nine p.m. There was no way it should've been possible, and yet it was. How could he have been running for so long, without a single second passing him by?

If Eddie was ill at ease before, now he was terrified. He had no idea where he was or how he'd gotten to this freaky airport terminal. There was no visible way out, and he couldn't remember how he'd gotten in no matter how hard he racked his brain trying. In addition, time itself seemed to have forsaken him. Worst of all, Eddie was absolutely alone. At least, he was sure he was at first.

Once he settled into a seat again to catch his breath and calm his racing heart, Eddie saw movement on the other side of the terminal. People, dressed all in black, shuffling aimlessly from one end of the airport to the next. Some were dragging suitcases, all hanging open with broken wheels that scraped and bounced across the polished floor with an eerie grinding noise. They all looked so sad; so scared; so lost... just like him. Unlike him, though, they didn't seem able to see Eddie, or each other for that matter. To his shock, he saw a few people walk right through each other. Like neither one of them really existed.

"Mr. Morella?"

Eddie leapt out of his skin and snapped his head toward the strange, gravelly voice that had addressed him. A man in his early to mid-thirties was standing beside him, although Eddie hadn't heard him walk up. Just like the young woman, the man wore a smart cranberry colored suit, his bleached blond hair slicked back away from his narrow, pointed face. He leaned down and offered Eddie his hand cordially, a greasy smile stretching his features.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, sir," the man said, bowing his head politely, "Friends call me Zeb; we've been looking forward to your arrival for some time now. May I get you a beverage, or some cookies, perhaps?"

Eddie blinked, leaning away from the outstretched, well-manicured hand. "N-No thanks," he muttered, "I just want to go home, please. Could you help me find the door?"

Zeb's cordial smile fell into a puzzled frown as his lean, slender figure straightened back up. "Home?" he repeated, smoothing his red silk tie in confusion. "Mr. Morella, I don't think you understand: you have no home. Not anymore. You're here now, and here you must stay." He held up a hand when Eddie tried to protest, that oily smile finding its way back to his thin, goateed lips.

"I know you must be confused," Zeb said, "...but please hold all your questions for the flight. You'll be boarding very soon. May I help you with your luggage?"

Eddie started to say "no", as he didn't have any luggage. When he looked down at the floor beside him, however, he was shocked to see a rolling carry-on sized bag by his foot. It seemed to be in better condition than the other bags he'd seen so far - it had functional zippers at least, and wheels that still worked - but its sudden appearance was as confusing and terrifying as everything else he'd seen that evening. Before he could breathe another word, Zeb grabbed the bag's telescoping handle and pulled Eddie to his feet by the elbow. At that time, the clock on the wall let out a mournful bong, drawing Eddie's attention to it. To his surprise, it now read 12:01 a.m.

"Flight 404 is now boarding," the young woman's crisp voice announced over the airport's P.A. system, "Zone one, please collect your luggage and have your boarding passes ready."

Squawking and bleating in protest, Eddie was dragged over to the desk again. The young woman's uncanny grin widened even further when she saw Zeb, adjusting the little silver wings on her lapel as he approached.

"Good evening, Mr. Bub," she chirped, "I had no idea you'd be here in person tonight. What's the occasion, if I may ask?"

"Please, Doris," Zeb cooed, "it's 'Zeb'. I came here to give Mr. Morella an escort. A man of his caliber is certainly deserving of one. Don't you think?"

"Oh, yes, sir," Doris said, nodding enthusiastically, "we're honored to have you both aboard! Please, go on through... and enjoy your flight."

Eddie frowned as Zeb urged him through the doors onto the collapsible walkway beyond it, more confused and on edge than ever before. Eddie Morella wasn't a special guy. The sad fact of the matter was that he'd been little more than mediocre for most of his life. In all his fifty-three years, the only name he'd been able to make for himself was "The Viper"; a moniker he'd been given courtesy of the FBI, after being placed on their top-ten most wanted list. No one outside the Cassetti Family - the people who orchestrated all his hits and filled out his paychecks - knew that he belonged to that name, though.

Who was this Zeb guy, and how did he find out such a sensitive tidbit of information? Was this some kind of elaborate sting, set up by the feds? If that's what this was, Eddie was in hotter water than he realized. And, if he was going down, he refused to go quietly.

"Look, whatever this is, I'm done playing along with it," Eddie snapped, yanking his arm free of Zeb's grip. "Let me out of here right now, Bozo, or else you'll have the entire Cassetti Family on your doorstep by tomorrow morning! And they won't be nearly as nice as me!"

"Not to worry, Mr. Morella," Zeb insisted, taking Eddie's arm again, "The Cassettis will all be joining us in due time. Come now: you don't want to miss your flight."

Eddie opened his mouth to protest again, ready to get physical with this Zeb joker if he had to, but he never got the chance to even raise a fist. In the blink of an eye, he was on the plane, being strapped into a first-class seat by another freakishly-smiling flight attendant. Like Doris, the woman at the gate, she wore a smart red skirt suit, neckerchief, and her hair tied back in a bun. Eddie's gaze was immediately drawn below the hemline of her pencil skirt, though, and not for the usual reason.

The flight attendant's legs were all wrong.

Instead of the long, sleek, shapely gams he expected, he saw a grotesque pair of unnaturally skinny legs with backwards-bending knees, covered in a fine layer of silken black fur. Where the flight attendant's feet should have been were two large, shiny red cloven hooves. He was too freaked out to even breathe when he saw them, a feeling that was only amplified when she turned and tottered away. Eddie was sure he was imagining things, because he thought he saw a long, barbed tail flicking between her legs as she sashayed up the aisle of the otherwise empty plane.

Zeb stood at the front of the cabin, grinning as he spoke into the P.A. system's microphone. "Good evening ladies, gentlemen, and others," he said casually, even though Eddie was the only passenger, "Please fasten your seatbelts, stow your tray tables, and put your seats in the upright position. We will be taking off in just a few minutes. There's quite a long flight ahead of us, so please settle in and get comfortable. We'll be arriving in Hell in roughly eighteen hours. We appreciate you traveling with us today... and thank you for choosing Limbo Airlines."