Greg tried not to flinch but did anyway.
“You don't understand.” Exasperation crept into his voice. “Death isn't cruelty. It's not random. It'ssacred. It's what gives life meaning. Without endings, nothing would matter. Every moment is preciousbecauseit's finite.”
“Are you seriously giving me a TED talk right now?”
“I'm trying to explain.”
“Explain what?” Dustin stepped closer. Greg stepped back—and his back hit the tree. “Are yougoing to repeat that bullshit about how death is beautiful and meaningful and part of the natural order? How you don'tcausedeath, you justguidepeople through it?”
“That's—yes. That's exactly?—”
“So what was cutting my parachute lines?”
Greg's mouth opened. Nothing came out. He was acutely aware of the bark pressing into his shoulder blades. Of how close Dustin was standing.
For a moment, he forgot how words worked.
“What was tackling me just now?” Dustin pressed. “You weren'tguidinganyone. You were trying to make sure that truck finished the job. That's not witnessing death. That's causing it.”
Was that…? What was that flash of metal? Was Dustin’stonguepierced?
Greg shook his head to shake himself out of his stupor.
Dustin misunderstood the gesture. “Don’t just shake your head. Fucking talk to me.”
“I was following orders.”
“Oh,thatagain.” Dustin laughed, harsh and humorless. “That's a great defense. Very original. Never been used by terrible people throughout history.”
“Morrith said?—”
“I don't give a shit what Morrith said.” Dustin’s hand hit the bark above Greg’s head. “You keep telling me the file said it was her time. You know what else the file said? That it wasmytime. Three days ago. And yet here I am.”
Greg had no answer for that.
He had no thought in his head at all.
Except that yes, Dustin’s tongue was definitely pierced. And he had gold flecks in his eyes.
“Are you even listening to me?”
“I—” Greg caught himself. “Of course I’m listening.But I don’t know what’s disrupting the natural order of things.”
“The natural order.” Dustin scoffed. “That girl was going to die because some guy in a truck wasn't paying attention. That's it. That's your sacred natural order. A distracted driver and a girl with her music too loud. Twenty-three years of life, gone, because ofthat.”
“You can't reduce the natural order to?—”
“I'm not reducing anything. I'm telling you what I saw.” Something flickered across Dustin’s face. An emotion Greg couldn’t place. He buried it fast. “You want to tell me death is meaningful? That it's beautiful? That it's some kind ofgift?”
Greg thought about his training. The speeches he'd memorized. The sacred duty of guiding souls through transition, of honoring the profound weight of mortality. He thought about how deeply he believed in the meaning of endings, the poetry of finite existence.
He opened his mouth to explain all of it.
“You don't know anything,” Dustin said.
He turned and walked away.
Greg stood under the tree for a long time, clipboard clutched to his chest, feeling oddly bereft.
